Life Is But A Dream
by Firefly Rebirth
Summary: {Complete} |Sequel to Dreams Before Yesterday| Nadia, now a teenager, feels she can never forgive Sora. Is there no chance for a happy family?
1. Daddy's Girl

Life Is But A Dream

_Row, row, row your boat_

_Gently down the stream_

_Merrily, merrily, merrily,_

_Merrily…_

_Life is but a dream_

~*~

            "Honey, be sure to finish weeding the garden while we're gone."

            "I will."

            "I know, but do it soon; it could rain tomorrow."

            "_Gotcha_.  Okay?"

            "Okay.  Oh, and Jalen—take good care of him."

            "Mom, I know already.  I've got everything covered!  Can't you trust me alone for one lousy week?"

            "I'm sorry, Nadia, I do trust you.  Oh, we've gotta go."

            "Have a good trip…"

            "Thanks, honey. You're the best."

            The teen accepted a hug from her mother, who proceeded to scoop up the remaining bag and give the little boy a kiss on the cheek.

            "'Bye…"  Nadia watched Kairi climb into the boat and sit next to her husband, who was busy undoing the knot that tied them to shore.

            "Bye-bye, Mommy!" Jalen squeaked.

            "I'll miss you, baby," Kairi called to her son, blowing another kiss his way.

            Nadia picked up her half-brother and sat him on her hip so his bare feet dangled.

            "Have a fun week, you two," Sora said, readying the oars.

            The boy waved; the girl didn't.

            They watched until the boat had disappeared over the blue horizon, and then Nadia carried Jalen back up the beach to the house.  She set him down.  The child toddled at her side.

            "Big sister," he said, grinning up at her with a freckle-splattered face.  He was wearing green overalls with a light brown shirt underneath.  His pant legs were rolled up to the knees and his bare feet and shins were covered in sticky sand, despite a bath of an hour prior.  Jalen had a round face shadowed by constantly messy brown hair.  His eyes were big and blue, like everyone in the family.  Nadia liked his eyes, since they looked much like her own and Kairi's.  The rest of him, she had the sneaking suspicion, would end up too much like Sora.

            But you couldn't blame a five-year-old for stuff like that.

            "Big sister," Jalen repeated, in case she hadn't heard him.

            "Yes, Jay?"

            He stuck out his presumably dry tongue and pointed at it.  "Thirsty."

            "Let's go have some lemonade then."

            "Okay!"  He ran ahead toward the kitchen.  It was an open place, its outer wall made almost entirely of glass.  There was a nice view of the garden.

            That huge garden Nadia had to finish weeding…

            Pouring the lemonade into two big cups, the girl said, "You and me get to spend the whole entire week together, Jay.  Isn't that great?"

            He was greedily watching the lemonade cascade down from the pitcher into his bright green cup.  "Yeah."

            They sat at the wooden table.  Jalen gulped and spilled a little on himself.  Nadia sipped.  Her eyes rested on the huge flowers approaching fruition, their buds resting on the porch's railing as they began to peak open.  Some of the vegetables were getting big, too.  She'd have to start part of the mid-season harvest.

            _It's Sora's garden.  Why does Mom always make me do his work?_

            Kairi and Sora were off to visit his parents on another island, the biggest in the chain.  Nadia, two weeks shy of her sixteenth birthday, was watching Jalen and the house.

            And the garden.

            And the dishes and the laundry and the trash and the cleaning and everything else that she had so violently insisted she could take care of and now was sort of regretting taking responsibility for.  Jalen was a handful by himself.  Even now he was crouched on the tile floor inspecting the large puddle of lemonade he had, accidentally or not, created there.

            "Jay!"

            A guilty smile…and the boy was forgiven.

            "Go get a towel, 'kay?"

            "Okay…"

            After lunch, when Jalen was down for his nap in the hammock stretched between the house and a youngish palm next to it, Nadia found herself on her hands and knees in the dirt.  A pile of weeds a foot tall sat behind her, and she added to it by the second.

            Laundry hung drying on the lines between the young palm and an older one down the hill a little, the sheets, shirts, and pants fixed with wooden clothespins.  Scrubbing that laundry in the wash bin with the smelly soap had taken most of the morning.  But she had it in her head to get the big chores done _today_.

            Nadia's dark, reddish hair was pulled back messily into a ribbon on the top of her head.  Strands fell across her darkened face and were glued there with sweat and dirt.  She was wearing an old tank top of yellow that probably was a bit too small but could afford to get dirty (besides, her mother wasn't around to complain).  Her feet were bare at the moment; that's how she liked them.

            She lifted her head for a moment to see if Jalen was okay.  He was sleeping peacefully.  Crawling back under the impossibly large leaves, she resumed her toil.

            _Damn, this garden is gonna be perfect for Sora.  Then he can't bother me about anything._

            It wasn't that the man made a habit of criticizing Nadia.  It was just that the _idea_ of him ever trying it was enough to make the girl shudder with anger.  She was worried if he ever went after her for something she'd just explode and make her mother and brother upset.  Maybe she worried a bit more about her brother…

            Whatever.

            Later, when night had come and she was washed, she would sit by her open bedroom window above the sea.  The cool breeze would blow through, and she could close her eyes and remember much happier times.  But, right now, Nadia was sweaty and dirty and really couldn't take any more stress than that which she was putting on herself.

            It was then that she heard a '_whoosh_' behind her.  She looked back, startled, to find an arrow plunged deep into the ground next to the weed pile.

            Nadia's eyes grew wide.  She thought of Jalen, and leapt up.  In her haste, she forgot about the vines barricading the most direct route to her brother.  Her ankles caused her to remember as they were caught in the middle of the web, and Nadia spun and swayed and fought, cursing the vines.

            Suddenly, a pair of arms was around her.  She wasn't very pleased about it.

            "Who the heck are you?" she growled, pushing herself away from the stranger who had come to her 'rescue.'  "Why are you here?"

            She eyed the man, who seemed slightly taken off guard by her anger.  He was young, with long blond hair down his back, some of which was loosely restrained by blue ties.  He was wearing a long-sleeved navy blue shirt rolled up to the elbows, and khaki trousers.  For being on an island, he seemed very pale and very clean, save a few muddy smudges on his arms where he had intercepted Nadia.

            And suddenly, in those almost white pants of his, the boy got down on one knee—in the mud and the dirt and the sand and everything.  He had one arm up across his chest and his head was bowed.

            "I came to see that no harm came to you, my lady, for one of my arrows took off too soon when I was testing this," he said, gesturing to an enormous bow-like thing with a lot of metal on it.  Nadia wondered why she had failed to notice it before.

            "What is that?"

            "An automatic crossbow.  I made it myself," he said, standing.  He seemed proud, too.

            "You could have killed somebody!  What if you hit my brother?"  Nadia waved her arm to the left, to the hammock where Jalen slept, blissfully unaware.

            "Forgive me.  I meant no harm."

            "Yeah, well, if anything had happened to either of us, you'd be in the ocean by now," Nadia mumbled dismissively, crouching down to return to her work.

            _What a weirdo…_

            "Why are you in the mud on a beautiful day like today?"

            "I've seen a lot nicer days than this."

            "Well, pardon me, but I am new to this island and I require a guide…"

            She waved her hand toward the village, still using the other to pull at stubborn weeds.

            "You can't show me the sights?"

            "There aren't any."

            "Oh, I'm sure there are some…"

            "Go find someone else to guide you around."

            "All those adults are busy, and the children are far too young.  You, on the other hand—"

            "Good grief!  I'm not even sixteen!"

            "What a coincidence!  I'm not even eighteen."

            She shuddered.  She didn't like where this was going.

            "Get out of here, lecher," Nadia snarled, throwing a huge pile of dirt, roots, and leaves his way.  He _was_ standing in front the weed pile, after all…

            The boy gave a cry and leapt to the side.

            "Perhaps I will find you later, when you are in a more…receptive mood," he told her, bowing as he made a hasty departure.

            "Perhaps _not_," Nadia told herself, relieved to finally be alone again.

            Around twilight, Nadia emerged from the public baths with soft, clean skin and hair hanging in dark, wet tendrils down her back and bare shoulders.  She had her used towel and soaps in a wooden bucket, which she carried on her hip as she walked through the village toward a more deserted part of the island.

            Selphie was watching Jalen tonight, a request the older woman had made herself upon seeing the younger covered in soil and various plant bits.  Nadia was glad for the break; she'd spent the earlier part of the evening chasing the boy around the entire house.  Things were sure a lot different when she had to play both mother _and_ big sister.

            Having some time to breathe for the first time all day, Nadia decided to let her feet take her down the beach to an isolated spot.  Her body often strove to go there, to this sacred place, but her mind protested because there was always so much work to be done.  But she allowed herself to visit several times a week.

              There, emerging only slightly from the sand, was an unassuming rock of blue and white, polished perfectly smooth by the sea.  Flowers of cream petals were planted behind the rock, flowers the girl had planted herself and watched over religiously.

            Nadia put her pail to the side and knelt by the stone.  She ran her fingers over it, dislodging small sand particles trapped inside the engraved letters.  She pressed her hands against the rock, which was being warmed by the setting sun.  The heat that radiated out onto her palms was only a whisper of the warmth she had once known.

            _Papa…_

            Her eyelids fluttered to a close, the lashes gently brushing moist cheeks.

            Times like this, with the burning twilight behind her and the darkness dead ahead, turned Nadia's to What If's.  What if her father was still alive?  What if she still had a united family?  What if she had little brothers or sisters that were all hers—and didn't partly belong to Sora?  These questions went on and on, but always boiled down to one thing.

            What if she could still be happy?

            Nadia wept.

            She left when it was mostly dark, feeling a bit distressed.  Selphie was probably wondering what was keeping her.  Nadia picked up her things and hesitantly left the gravesite, bidding her father an apologetic goodbye.

            "See you later, Papa," she whispered, walking away backwards.

            Nadia then fell, tripping on some rock or tree trunk or _something_ (it was too dark to tell).

            "Ah!  I was a second too late!" said a voice, sounding disappointed.

            Nadia looked upward from her place stretched on the ground.  She had a very…unflattering view of the boy from before.

            _Him?  No way!_  She considered the situation briefly.  At least she didn't have to thank him for anything (he hadn't saved her, had he?) and it was now impossible for him to see her eyes reddened by tears.

            Nadia sat up, careful not to bump him.  She gave an extra rub to her eyes just in case.  Then she stood.

            Or, rather, _tried_ to stand.

            "Hey, are you all right?" he said, crouching and worrying in response to her cry of pain.

            _No way…_  Life was not kind.  Life was cruel…and horribly cliché.

            "My ankle…I think I twisted it."

            _Damn!_ she shrieked more than once inside her mind.  _Damn.  Damn.  Damn…!_

            "Then allow me to carry you home!" the boy cried.

            _He sounds…ecstatic…_Nadia thought, horrified.

            He swooped her up, one arm around her shoulders and the other under her knees.  He began to walk—well, it was more like a jog, or maybe even a sprint.

            Was he…humming?

            Inside, Nadia was feeling increasingly troubled.  She had never been carried by anyone…not since her father.  Anyone.  She started remembering the times he had lifted her and spun her in the air…

            _"Papa!  Papa, I'm flying!"_

            "Please…please put me down," she murmured, trying to hold back the pain welling up in her heart.

            She must have sounded sincere this time (and not merely annoyed), for he complied quickly, setting her down to sit on the sand.

            They were still a ways from the village, sitting and kneeling in the very near-dark under a cluster of palm trees.

            "I apologize…  Did I upset you?"

            "No.  Sorry.  It's not your fault.  I just…"

            She was feeling a little better now.  A chilly breeze took her away from the warm memories and back under the tree with the strange boy.  Perhaps it would rain tomorrow…

            "I'm sorry," Nadia said.  "I'm just silly, I guess."

            The boy sounded like he knew it was much more than that, but didn't choose to pry.  She was glad for that.  "All right," was all he said.

            They sat in silence, listening to crickets chirp and the waves crash against the shore far below.  A few fireflies emerged from daytime hibernation.  The soft orbs glowed, in synch with an alien rhythm, communicating with each other in one of the most beautiful languages Nadia had ever witnessed.

            "I need to get back and get my brother," Nadia explained apologetically.  She was a little sad to leave this tranquil scene—even if she _was_ sharing it was a 'lecher.'

            "You can lean on me instead of being carried," the boy said.  He helped her stand and limp back to the village, a slow and awkward process.

            They paused at the door of Selphie's house.  Light fell across the ground from inside, a little of it bathing the young man.

            "I never asked your name," he said.

            "Nadia," she replied distractedly.  In the back of her mind she was pondering how to apologize to Selphie for the inconvenience…

            The boy won back her attention by falling to his knee and taking her hand against his lips.  "What a lovely name that is, my lady."

            She was struggling to get her hand back, suddenly reminded of why she thought him a lecher…

            "And I am Edgar.  Edgar Figaro."

            Nadia snatched her hand away at last and used it to cover her mouth, trying to restrain a snicker.  _What a ridiculous name!_

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Anyone surprised?  The lovable womanizer of FFVI is back—ten years younger!  Whoo-hoo!  I decided to put him in instead of throwing in another character from scratch.  Oh, Edgar, you are so horribly wonderful!

I honestly have to apologize for this chapter.  Over the past few days, I've spent an ungodly number of hours _pouring_ over it…  Re- and re-editing…You wouldn't believe all the little changes I kept making and all the places I really got stuck…and even now I don't think it's what it could be.  I'm posting it now because I am just sick of switching sentences around ;_;  I'm really hoping this story turns out well.  I feel pressured to make it _uber_-good since it features an OC…  And I'm worried it's not yet at the level of quality it truly should be.  It's starting off a little slow and disjointed…but I _do_ have ideas as to where it's headed.  There will be, of course, lots of Sora and Kairi (probably starting next chapter?)

Ah, I should stop moaning and groaning!  At least people are reading it, eh?  Eh?  *crickets*  ;__________;


	2. Summer Storms

~*~

            Thunder rumbled, crackling and sputtering overhead.

            The walls rattled a little.

            "I hope Nadia's okay," Kairi said, looking out past the veranda toward the stormy ocean, presumably across the sea to where her home and children were.

            Sora glanced up from his reading.  He was seated on his parents' couch in their front room.  He and Kairi had arrived yesterday afternoon; it was a day later.

            "She really hates storms.  You know, ever since…"

            "She hates a lot of things 'ever since.'"  Sora went back to the newspaper.  "And I'm at the top of her list."

            Kairi frowned.

            "Sora…"

            "I know.  I should try harder, right?  I've _been_ trying—for eight years.  She just keeps pushing me away."  He turned the page and continued reading.

            The woman finally ceased her pacing in front of the large window.  She joined her husband on the couch and leaned back heavily into the cushions.  Her hand rested on her belly, where her third child was growing—Sora's second.

            "I feel like she hates me more every year, too," Kairi mumbled.

            "She doesn't hate you.  You're her mother."

            "But…"  She sighed.  She knew Sora didn't want to talk about Nadia.  He rarely did.  She was only bothering him now, wasn't she?

            Outside, lightning rippled across the sky.

            Silently, Kairi rose and left Sora to his paper.

            The thunder boomed.

            The walls shook.

~*~

            Kairi sat in the kitchen with her head in her hands and her hands resting on the large wooden table in the middle of the room.

            She couldn't stand being around Sora like this…not when he got so distant.  Did he not care about Nadia's attitude anymore?  Did he not care about the huge rift in their family?

            "Kairi?"

            It was Sora's mother, a kindly woman with soft brown hair highlighted by a few strands of gray.  Her eyes were very light blue, like the summer sky, and always very welcoming.

            Kairi looked up at the woman.  She had never known her own mother.  The closest to parents she had ever had growing up were kindly village women who shared the responsibility of feeding, clothing, and educating her.  But there had never been one single woman—one person to hold Kairi late at night when she woke up a nightmare, one person to always kiss her knee when it got scraped.

            The older woman put a kettle of water over the fire and patiently remained in front of the hearth.  As she moved, her full skirt of tan swayed about her in waves of fabric.  She was something of what Kairi had fantasized her true mother to be:  warmhearted, beautiful, calm, intelligent…  Even a slightly wry sense of humor lurking underneath.

            But Kairi didn't need jokes right now.  She needed a shoulder.  Her companion was wise to this:  she brought Kairi steaming tea that was dark and strong.  She sat next to Kairi and touched the younger woman's hand.

            "Andra," Kairi mumbled, but she found words bunching up on her tongue, refusing to come out.

            "You can tell me anything," Sora's mother replied, nudging the mug a little closer toward Kairi.  "Or, you don't have to say anything at all.  I just figured you needed company, that's all."

            "Sometimes I think you have psychic powers or something," Kairi replied, a hint of laughter in her voice.

            "I haven't been a woman for all this time for nothing."

            "You can see right through me, I know."

            "I'm not prying, Kairi."

            The red-haired woman leaned over the mug in front of her and let steam fill her nostrils.  The scent was intense.  Kairi felt a little less dreamy and sulky.  She felt more awake.  The pain in her heart dulled slightly.

            "Ah, so it's working," Andra replied.  "My mother gave this to me whenever I would fight with Sora's father.  Just wait until you drink it.  I know it always cleared _my_ head."

            "Sora and I didn't fight…"

            "Misunderstanding?"

            Kairi's hand slipped off the table and returned to her belly, to the life that grew within.  "I'm just a little scared…"

            "About another baby?  You're still plenty young, sweetheart."

            "No, not that.  I'm not worried about _having_ the baby.  I'm just worried about…"  She sighed.  "About bringing another child into a family where there is so much pain."

            Andra gestured to the mug.  "Take a sip."

            Kairi obeyed.  "Wow…this is amazing…"

            "Makes everything seem a little clearer, hmm?"

            "Yes."

            "Now…  What about this pain?  Is your marriage in trouble?"

            Kairi shook her head.  "No, no, Sora is as wonderful as ever, and we still love each other very much.  Our marriage is wonderful…at least it would be.  The problem, well…  It's Nadia."

            "Nadia does have her troubles.  I think she's a good person, though."

            "Of course she is.  It's just that…she refuses to get along with Sora.  She was so young, you know…  Her mind connects Sora's return with her father's death.  In a way, I think she might even _blame_ him for what happened to Riku!"

            But that idea was ridiculous, wasn't it?

            Kairi drank a little more.  The pungent taste lingered on her tongue.

            "As Nadia gets older, she gets angrier.  Towards me as well."

            "Even today, no one really understands what happened to Riku," Andra told her, rubbing Kairi's back gently.  "And it's probably hardest for Nadia."  

            "It's hard for me, too," Kairi said in her own defense.

            The other woman just smiled sympathetically, but proceeded to push her point forward. 

            "When you're a child, your whole world is your parents.  So, think about it:  she lost _half_ her world.  After Riku died, things began to change a lot for her."

            "I know that.  Kids see things in black and white.  I thought that she would understand better as she grew up.  But it's just the opposite!"

            "Kairi, just give it some time.  Nadia's an intelligent young lady.  You and I both know that.  With time, she will begin to see the grays in between."

            By this time, Kairi was polishing off her tea.  "Thanks, Andra.  For your conversation—and for this miracle tea.  What in the world do you make it with?"

            The older woman just laughed.  "Oh, honey, I just put in four times as many tea leaves as usual!"

~*~

            All his hair was white, now.  All that was left of it, anyway.  His face had more wrinkles.  His breathing was worse.  His body was thinner.  And his eyes…they sometimes seemed slightly dim.

            "Hi, Dad," Sora said, sitting down.

            The old man's eyes brightened up and his dried, thin lips curved into a smile.  "Sora!  When did you get here?"

            "Yesterday, but…"

            "Yeah.  I'm afraid I was getting over a bit of a cold."  His speech was raw and broken; words alternated with sharp and painful-sounding breaths.

            "Dad…"

            "I know.  I do own a mirror."

            Sora took his father's wrist into his own hand.  He could have traced every bone—had he wanted to.  There was no fat at all.  The skin was loose, limp, and horribly pale.

            "_Dad_…"

            "I'm old, Sora.  It happens to the best of us."

            Sora just gulped.  He'd been here not too long ago for his father's seventieth birthday celebration.  And now, in the course of a few months…

             "I'm surprised I made it this far—"  He paused for several tense moments, wheezing and then coughing.  Sora jumped up and pounded his back.

            His father gave him an appreciative nod.  "Your mother took excellent care of me—despite my protests."

            Sora smiled slightly, but he could not keep sadness from his eyes.

            "She made me quit smoking, finally…  Too late I fear.  Doctor says my lungs are as good as shot."  He held one frail hand to his chest and inhaled slowly, wincing.

            "Dad—"  Sora's youthful hand bolted out.

            "I knew I was heading down this road, son.  We are all on it.  Just some of us have been traveling longer."

            "Don't say stuff like that, Dad."

            "You're right.  I'd rather talk about my grandchildren."

            There was a sparkle in the old man's eyes, brighter than the stars twinkling above in the clear night sky.  Sora sat there on the veranda, facing his father, touching his father's hand, gazing into his father's eyes.  His father was in a rocking chair with a blanket over his legs, and Sora was on a short bench pulled up before him.

            "Oh—God…  I should have brought them..."

            "No…  I'd rather have Jalen remember me—_if_ he remembers me—as I was a few months ago."

            "Of course he'll remember you!" Sora cried, a little defensive.  He saw only passiveness in the old man's face and added somberly, "I wouldn't let him forget you, Dad."

            A chill lingered in the air, but they ignored it.

            "All right, Sora.  All right."

            "Damn!" the young man exclaimed, lurching upward from his seat.  "I don't like talking about you in the past tense!"

            "Soon, though—"

            "Please, Dad, _no_…  You'll be here a while longer, won't you?"

            And he was crying out from inside his heart, fighting for some sense of closeness absent from his youth—a level of connection he had brushed off, undervalued, during childhood.  Perhaps he had once had something and foolishly ignored it…  Perhaps it was too late now…

            "The one that's coming now.  Think it will be another son?  Or a daughter?"

            "Dad…"

            "I personally like girls," the old man said, grinning with slightly yellowed teeth.  "They make even-tempered babies, or so I've seen."

            His son looked down at his slightly hollowed face.  A few tears began to slide down Sora's cheeks.  They shimmered brightly in the starlight.

            "Now _you._  Boy!"  The old man whistled.  "You were such a fussy kid!  As soon as you could, you were out of your crib, crawling and stumbling and whatnot.  You tried walking so many times before you got the hang of it.  But you kept getting up, kept trying to escape—first your room, then the house, then, it seemed, the island."  He chuckled.

            "Dad…"

            "You knew what you wanted—the whole world!  You wanted to see everything.  An optimistic thirst for adventure, the neighbors called it—when they were being polite anyway.  But it was damned frightening for me and your mother!  We thought you were going to get yourself killed..."

            "Dad…"

            The old man stopped his excited talk and looked up, looked up from the creaking rocking chair and the blanket across his bony old knees.  "Your mother…  You will take care of her for me, won't you?"

            Sora threw his arms around his father.  He throat began to heave with choked sobs, as there existed no words profound enough for the moment.

            "Sora, my son, my only son…  I love you…  I'm so very proud of you…"

            Together, they wept.

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This chapter went much more easily for me, and I'm glad.  I did the first part before and was able to get the last two sections done in about two hours (which is pretty good for me).  Editing was another few minutes, but I only did so once or twice, so forgive me if you find more errors than usual.  I know proofreading right after you write is a horrible idea, I should let it sit for a few days, then edit, etc…  Well, I'll do this and a hundred times as much when I'm an actual novelistß CAUTION:  _wishful thinking ahead!!!_

Thank you for your kind reviews, everyone!  They really inspired me and I'm really bursting with plans for _Life Is But A Dream._  This chapter would have had a Nadia segment and not been so short, but I wanted to keep the focus on Kairi and Sora.  I honestly don't know how well I'm doing with their characters nowadays since they are now in their early thirties.  O.o`  I know Nadia should be more genuine since I'm actually her age (16).  If you'd like to know, a lot of the relationships here are extrapolated from different levels of interaction I've witnessed within generations of my own family (gotta love my family—and I do!).  Perhaps a close father/child relationship is more of my wishful thinking, since my father hasn't really been a father to my sisters and me for ten years.  It's very strange to live in a house with a man you hardly know, someone who used to act like he loved you…  Heh.  Life sure is full of those bittersweet bits, ne?  

Enough of that melodrama…  I'm very disappointed in today's world upon finding out how many of you don't know the glory that is FFVI!  Go out and buy Final Fantasy Anthology **now**!  It is well worth your money.  Discover Crystals, Espers, dragons…a stupid purple octopus—wait, scratch that last one (I hate you, Ultros!) Most of all, you've gotta have the sheer _beauty_ of the opera scene…  Y'all _need_ 6.  'Tis a classic, my friends!  Let the 2D magic into your hearts!

[/preaching]  Stay tuned…!


	3. Rainbows Above

~*~

            Nadia shuddered with each clap of thunder.  She hated storms—just _hated_ them.

            She had closed every curtain in the entire house so there would be no chance of seeing the rain as it poured down the window in thick, fluid sheets.  But the lightning and thunder she couldn't avoid; the bright blasts had a tendency to penetrate the curtains, and the booms were strong enough to shake the house.

            Jalen was oblivious to his sister's suffering.  He peeked behind the huge curtains lining the kitchen wall.  "Sister, wanna go play?"

            "Out th-there?"  She stared at him, stunned.  "No way!"

            The little boy's hand dropped the curtain and he gave her an inquisitive look.

            "You little nut case," Nadia teased, scooping the boy up into her arms.  She plopped him down on the kitchen table and sat down in front of him.

            "Big sister?"

            "Yeah?"

            "Could ya—"

            "_Ahh_!"  Nadia screamed and clamped her eyes shut as the room was bathed in intense white light.  In a split second an enormous rumble of thunder followed it.  She screamed once more.  "Oh my God!  That must have struck right outside the house!"

            "Jalen will protect you!"

            She looked at the boy and couldn't help but crack a smile.

            "Thank you, Jay.  I feel less scared already."  And it was true; she was distracted from her fear and memories, at least for the time being.  "My brave little knight."

            He smiled proudly.

            "Wouldn't you prefer a slightly bigger knight?"

            Nadia eyes grew wide.  That wasn't…  No, couldn't be…

            "Edgar Figaro, at your service," said the young man, bowing at her side.  He was rather soaked, from his mane of blond hair to his white sweater and dark jeans.

            She stared down at him dumbly.  "How the heck did you get in here?"

            Edgar stood and began to wipe water from his clothing.  "I was going to wait and knock, but I heard a scream and knew I was needed straight away."

            Nadia smacked her forehead with one very frustrated palm.  "You are not needed!  Now, could you kindly get your knightly self _out of here_?"

            But he was in the middle of a lot of "knightly" gestures, and Jalen was laughing madly and clapping his hands together in childish delight.

            _Jay…  You're only encouraging him…_

            Edgar bowed to the five-year-old.  "Ah, good sir, I am quite pleased to make your most _honorable _acquaintance…"

            Jalen clapped his hands again.  "Big sister, he's funny!"

            Nadia developed a sly smile.  "Hey, Edgar?"

            "Yes?"  He looked up immediately, his face hopeful.

            "I have a deal for you."

            "Yes?"

            "You can stay here this afternoon for as long as you want…"

            "_Yes_?"

            "As long as you watch Jay for me."

            But the man just smiled and nodded excitedly.  He put his arm around the boy's shoulders.  "We'll have a great time!"

            "Okay, I'll go find you some dry clothes.  Then we can all have lunch."  _And then_, she thought happily and wistfully, _I can finally relax._

            Nadia was humming slightly as she made her way up to the bedrooms.  She almost forgot about the storm until the thunder came again.  Glad to be by herself in a humiliating time of discomfort, she slid against the wall, gripping hard to the stair's railing.

            _"Papa…  Papa's not scared of anything…"_

            No.  No more memories!  No more visions of her father out in the rain, battling an invisible enemy.  No more pictures of his sleeping face—eternally sleeping—as drops of water washed over it, made it cold.  His pale face, ice cold and calm…

            "Papa," Nadia whispered, clutching at her chest.  She folded her body in two, struggled to climb the stairs, draged herself against the wall.  She had always thought the pain in her heart would fade…

            But it persisted to be as sharp a dagger in her chest as it had been the day her father died.

            "Nadia?"

            The girl froze.  She turned her head slightly, horrified, and saw Edgar looking up at from the base of the stairs.

            _No…  Don't look at me like that—like you know what I'm going through!_

            She started running, scrambling up the stairs, tripping and falling and biting her lip to stop herself from crying out.  She ran and slammed the door shut behind her.

            Then she realized where she was.

            "Papa's room…"

            Nadia fell against the door and slid downward.

~*~

            Jalen tugged the blond man's sleeve.

            The man glanced down at him with worried eyes before going back to staring up the staircase to where Nadia had just disappeared.

            "Big sister…"  What was wrong with her?

            The man, Edgar, crouched down so he was at the boy's height.  "Hey there, little guy.  Your sister sure isn't fond of storms, is she?"

            "Rain makes her sad."

            "I can see that," sighed the man.  He ran his hand through loose blond hair.  Water sprinkled onto Jalen, and the boy jumped.

            "You wouldn't happen to have any towels in this house, would you?"

            "Yep!"

            Glad to be of service, the child promptly returned with a large green towel (his favorite color).

            Edgar wiped himself down and then pulled the towel through his hair.  The strands fuzzed and stuck out at all sorts of strange angles.  He found himself being laughed at and furiously tried to press his hair back down with both hands.  Jalen kept laughing and then Edgar was chuckling softly, too.

           "C'mon, let's go do something nice for your big sister.  She seems to be having a rough time."

            Jalen was overjoyed to be in the company of such an admirable knight.

~*~

            Many long minutes passed as Nadia sat perfectly still in the dimness of her father's dusty room.  It had not been entered for eight years, when Kairi had braved the crossing of the threshold in order to find something formal for the man to be buried in.  Since then, though, it had been sealed like a tomb, an invisible lock barring the door.

            Nadia, her mother, and even Sora passed by the room with heads bowed and eyes down—at least when they absolutely had to cross anywhere near it.  The place was almost like a time capsule, the girl thought.

            She rose, hugging herself tightly.  She was wearing a baggy orange sweatshirt that was longer than the tight khaki shorts under it.  She had on long socks striped orange and cream all the way past her knees.

            Lightning ripped across the sky outside.  Nadia saw it since she, of course, hadn't been in here to close the curtains before.  She could see the sky, endless and dark as it brewed ominously above the choppy ocean.  Without realizing it, she allowed her long legs to carry her to the window.

            Nadia touched the glass.  The rain covering it distorted her view of the beach below, just as tears could blur a person's vision.  It was a strange parallel.

            The window was wet and cold.  The girl drew her hand away.

            Thunder rumbled across the sea.  Nadia didn't shudder this time.  The world seemed unreal to her at that moment, and her sense of fear was consequently dulled.

            Her hand had left an outline on the glass.  Nadia was reminded of the times when she, as a child, had put her hand up against Riku's for comparison.  His hand had always dwarfed hers considerably, maybe being three or four times as large.  His fingers were calloused from practicing with swords and staffs and therefore much rougher than the baby soft skin of a child.

            There was another bolt of lightning, explosively white.  Nadia saw that there, on the desk right beside the window, was a child's painting of a bright rainbow stretching across the sky.  As the thunder rumbled, she noticed that, beneath the rainbow, there were three people holding hands.  It was a terribly crude and childish piece of work…

            It was hers.

            And then she suddenly could see herself, ten years younger, searching for just the right shade of red for her and Mommy's hair, and then trying to mix an intense enough blue for Papa's eyes.  And then, when she had finally finished the painting, she ran all around the house and showed it to her parents and joyfully accepted their words of praise.  The paint hadn't dried all the way yet, so some of the colors in the rainbow ran together.  She was upset, but Papa had said it was more like a real rainbow that way…

            Nadia touched the image of her father's face.  It was little more than an oval with two bright blue dots for eyes and a curved line and dot of black for the smile and nose.  His hair she had made the same fair blue as the sky.  As her finger came in contact with the paper, she could feel it was buried in dust, maybe as much as half an inch.

            She grabbed the painting from the table and began to shake it in the air.  Dust went everywhere and she coughed uncontrollably.

            More lightning and Nadia saw the cloud of dust and through it her smiling face as a little girl.  She fell to her knees.

            The door creaked open.  Nadia threw the painting on the desk and stood up.  She pretended to be busy pulling her long socks farther up her legs.

            "Nobody ever goes in there," she could hear Jalen saying.  She saw her brother lingering nervously in the hallway.  Edgar was in the doorway, but not inside the room either.

            "Nadia?" the young man asked cautiously.

            She couldn't help it; she looked back at the painting.  "There's no more rainbows," she said quietly.  She was a little surprised to hear an ethereal element in her own voice.

            "I'm sure they'll be one after this storm clears."

            Nadia just shook her head.  She thought about the painting sitting here in the musty old tomb of a room for years and years.  She thought about her happiness being buried there along with it.

            She heard the floorboards squeak.  Edgar was stepping into the room, just a little.

            "No!" she cried out, rushing him.  She slammed into the man and they almost fell out into the hall, out of the room and down the stairs.  Edgar caught her and she remained smashed up against his body, the top of her head stuck into his soaked chest—like she was a charging bull or something.

            Time stopped for who knows how long, and then came back to normal very gradually.  Everything felt very unreal and distant.  It was a little scary.

            Nadia backed away from him, her head down.  "I don't want anyone in there.  I don't want a stranger in there!"

            "O-Okay," Edgar said, sounding a bit like he was still recovering from the shock of being pushed toward certain doom.

            Nadia ran one hand through her long, tangled red hair, pulling it away from her face.  She dared to look up to his, but did not meet his eyes.

            "I'm sorry," she mumbled.  She backed up and closed the door behind her.  She was a little relieved inside as she felt the invisible lock clicking back into place.  The only physical reminder of the past twenty or so minutes was the dust all over her sweatshirt.  This she began to brush off.

            "I'm not trying to pry," Edgar explained, a smile returning to his face.  "Jalen and I made lunch, that's all.  We came up to tell you."

            "Yummy pancakes, big sister!" the much younger boy elaborated.

            "Sounds good, Jay," Nadia said.  She smiled a little herself, but more for their sake then her own.

            She finally got Edgar some dry clothes (old things of Sora's, which she didn't care about using), and the trio ate a hearty meal of pancakes down in the kitchen.  They talked about a lot of ridiculous things involving knights and Jalen loved it.

            Toward the end of the afternoon, the storm at last cleared and the three ventured outside.  Nadia watched as the boys had a mock swordfight with wet branches Edgar had freed of excess twigs and leaves.

            Edgar was, quite tragically, beaten by the five-year-old when he stopped to point out a faint rainbow above the calming sea.  Nadia ran down to the shore for a better view.  She admired it for a long while, not saying anything, even when the young man came to her side.

            "See?" Edgar asked.  "I didn't lie to you."

            Nadia shifted uncomfortably when he leaned closer to her.  _He's not going to kiss me or something ridiculous like that_, she worried, already planning where she would plant her fist if such a thing were to occur.

            But the boy just grinned at her, waved to Jalen with the wet wooden 'sword,' and left.  Presumably he was returning to wherever it was he came from.

            She looked back up at the sky.  The rainbow had faded, leaving no trace of its brief yet beautiful existence.

            Nadia started back up to Jalen and the house.  The sand was good and wet beneath her dirtied orange and white striped socks.  Cold, moist wind pressed against her bare skin.  She was quite glad for a taste of reality.

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	4. Happy Home

Chapter Four:  Happy Home

            Kairi pulled her yellow skirt up a little to facilitate climbing out of their boat.  Her skirt was long, light, and accompanied by a white tank top.  She took the bags down the dock as Sora finished tying up the small wooden vessel.

            "I always love coming home," Kairi remarked, surveying the island.  It was so nice to know that, just around the bend, was the huge house built from the ancient tree.  The house—no, the _home_—that she shared with the people that meant the most to her in "any and all worlds out there," as Sora once had said.

            Her husband was at her side a moment later.  The man kissed her cheek gently and held her waist with one arm.  It was midday; they had left his parents fairly early.

            Kairi touched her neck.  It still felt naked without the heavy mane of dark red.  She had cut her hair not too long ago, returning it to its length of almost twenty years earlier.  Now it was long enough to only curve around the bottoms of her ears.  It was a drastic change, but a welcome one.  She simply didn't have time to take care of a yard of hair.

            She slung her satchel across her shoulder and picked up her small handbag from the sand-covered dock.  Sora grabbed his things too and, hand in hand, they started for home.

            Kairi knew there were a lot of things of which she would never tire.  Feeling Sora's fingers wrapped around her own was definitely at the top of that list.  No matter how many millions of hours she spent near him, she continued to love the man more and more each day.  There were so many people she loved, and her heart just kept growing to encompass them all.

            Sometimes, it was a little overwhelming.

            After being away for a week, she was eagerly awaiting a reunion with her children.  She had one worry, though, and it was Nadia.

            "You promised to try and get along with her better," Kairi reminded Sora when the village and house came into view.  "For my sake, Sora."

            "_I_ will try," he said, sounding doubtful.

            "In just a few days, she's going to be sixteen…  I can't believe it."

            "I feel old."

            "Well, don't," she insisted, prodding his ribs.  "Because I'm the same age you are and I am _not_ old!"

            He just laughed, and she laughed with him a little, trying to get her thoughts to steer away from the silver-rimmed glasses sitting in the study.

            Sora stopped suddenly, squinting up at the house.  "Hey, did Nadia get a boyfriend when we were away?"

            "Eh, what?"  Kairi was squinting, too, straining to make the three figures in front of her house become clearer.  There was Nadia and there was Jalen…and someone with long blond hair she didn't recognize.  "What do you mean _boy_friend?"

            "You need to wear those glasses more often," Sora teased, guiding her farther up the hill.  "Look, that thing is definitely male."

            "And entirely too old for her!  Who is he?"

           "C'mon, Mama Wolf, you were just talking about how she's already sixteen."

            "Not yet she's not sixteen."

            Kairi sped up her ascent toward the house and the group of people.  Jalen saw her first and ran down into the woman's arms.  She hugged him and kissed his cheeks and forehead.

            "Welcome home, Mommy!"

            "Thank you, sweet," she murmured, holding him tightly against her body as she knelt on the ground.  "I missed you so much!"

            "Hi, Mom," Nadia said, standing behind Jalen.  Her hair was in two thick braids on the sides of her head.  The look on her tanned face was a little awkward, as usual.  She _was_ making an effort to smile, though.

            "Daddy!"  Jalen ran behind Kairi to his father.

            "Hey there, big guy," Sora said, holding the boy up in his arms.  "I think you've gotten bigger since I last saw you."

            Kairi stood and brushed sand from her skirt.  "He's always growing."

            Sora nodded.  With Jalen on his hip, he straightened out a little.  "Hi, Nadia.  How are you doing?"

            Kairi looked anxiously toward the girl.

            A tense pause, and then…

            "Hi, Sora."

            _I guess I can't ask for more than that_, Kairi thought.  She embraced her daughter warmly.  "Aren't you going to introduce us?"

            "Huh?"

            "To your friend?"

            "Oh," Nadia said calmly, glancing back at the blond young man behind her.  "He's Edgar.  He just kinda showed up."

            "Nice to meet you," the newcomer said, bowing his head toward Kairi and then Sora.  "I just moved to this island last week."

            "What about your parents?" Sora wondered.

            He just shrugged.  "They're at home.  I'm starting out on my own."

            "How old are you, exactly?" Kairi wanted to know.

            "Seventeen, miss."  He just smiled under the heat of her scrutinizing glare.

            _I guess he's not too bad…  He seems polite enough…  I can't remember the last time I was called 'miss,' anyway._

            "Let's all go have something cold to drink," Sora suggested, tottering a bit as he tried to simultaneously get his bag and hold onto Jalen.

            "Let me take that, sir," Edgar said, offering his hand for the bag.

            "Thanks," Sora replied.  "That's nice of you."

            Kairi looked at Nadia and saw her daughter had a strange expression on her face.  It seemed like a little bit of anger was in her features somewhere…  Now why in the world would she be angry?

            _I don't think I'll ever understand her completely_, Kairi thought with a mental sigh.

~*~

            Nadia looked up when she heard a knock on her bedroom door.

            "Oh, hi, Mom," she said, putting aside the book she had been reading.  "Is it time for me to help make dinner?"

            "In a minute," Kairi told her, sitting down on the bed.  She stretched her arms behind her and leaned back on her palms, then turned to Nadia and smiled.  "I haven't seen my daughter for a week.  I'd like to have a little time with her."

            The girl nodded.  Her mother was really beautiful, even without all her hair.  Short hair seemed to suit Kairi better for some reason, although this was the first time Nadia had seen it that way.

            Nadia hadn't had her hair more than trimmed since she was seven.  Her father had always cut it for her and she couldn't dream of anyone else doing it…

            "_So_?"

            "Oh, sorry…I was thinking.  Did you ask me something?"

            "Yes, Nadia.  About that Edgar boy."

            "Yeah, what a weirdo, huh?"

            "Hmm?"  Kairi looked confused.

            _I guess he was acting regular around them…_  "Jalen sure loves him."

            "Those three are playing right now.  Something about knights?"

            The girl nodded.  "Sounds right for Edgar.  He's got some strange obsession with being a gentleman."

            "And you're complaining?"

            _Eh…  It _is_ kinda creepy.  But…I didn't mind until he started being so nice to Sora…_

            "Nadia?"

            "Yeah?"

            "You look a little upset.  Want to be left alone?"

            Nadia shrugged.  She could never say anything bad about Sora, because her mother would instantly jump to his defense.  It had happened before.  "No, Mom.  Um…  Let's go make dinner, 'kay?"  Before getting an answer, she got up and hurried out of her room and down the stairs.  Her mother was behind her after a hesitant moment.

            Down in the kitchen, the main course, soup, was already simmering over the fire.  Nadia retrieved some of the vegetables she had harvested from the garden and began washing and cutting them for a salad.  Kairi was quiet and started slicing pieces from a big loaf of bread.

            "Where did you get that?" Nadia wondered.  "You didn't have time to make it today, did you?"

            "No.  It's from Andra," her mother explained, sawing another piece off the dark and hearty loaf.  "She also gave me some fresh fruit from their orchard that we can have for dessert."

            "So how are they?"

            Kairi put down the bread knife and was quiet for a moment.  "Sora's father isn't very well…"

            "Oh…"  Nadia felt sad.  She really did like Sora's parents.  "I'm sorry."

            "So am I, honey," the woman said, wrapping the unused half of the bread in some cloth and setting it aside.  "But, you know, he's seventy…  These things happen."  However, even as she spoke these words and went back to her work, her eyes wandered outside to where Sora ran around with Jalen and Edgar in mock battles.

            Nadia looked out at them too.  Then she thought, _Mom's right.  Sora's father is seventy.  Mine was twenty-five.  And I had no warning…_

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this chapter is short and horrible…sorry.  i'm really depressed as of last night so i can't honestly say i care much at the moment…  i'd much rather not feel so empty on the inside.  anyway, yes, i am leaving tomorrow and will be gone all of next week, so no updates.


	5. Progress Ruined

~*~

            "I'm sixteen today, Papa…"

            Dawn was still many minutes away.  The sky was a light purple near the horizon, then blue and, lastly, almost black as one's eyes traversed the rest of the sky.  The wind was cold and unforgiving.  The leaves of the trees and brush sagged under the weight of the morning dew.

            Silently, Nadia stood in a simple white dress that tied around her neck and the middle of her back and then, at her waist, widened into a full skirt that billowed as she walked.  Her hair, red and dark and long, along with her dress, was caught in the cold morning air and trailed behind her.

            The morning was full of mist as the day's humidity met the night's chill.  Frigid droplets of moisture gathered on her bare arms, feet, and face.  She stretched to her full height, trying to feel tall and lean and strong.

            Slowly, Nadia eased down into a kneeling position.  She placed a single white blossom across the gravestone, and then pressed the palm of her hand on the sand.

            "I know that you've been watching over me, Papa.  For my whole life."

            She rose, holding her body rigid.  She didn't even shiver, despite the cold and the wet.

            "I'll make you proud of me."

            And the last words she whispered.

            "I promise…"

~*~

            Kairi pushed the door open, holding her breath.  She felt scared and excited and sad all at once.

            "_Happy Birth_—"

            But the words, half-finished, echoed in an empty room.

            Nadia's sheets and nightclothes were piled together clumsily in a heap on the bed.  Her slippers lay askew in the middle of the floor.  Her mother stood in sheer puzzlement at the door.

            Now where could that girl have gone off to—and before seven in the morning?

            Kairi felt Sora's presence behind her, even before the man put his hands on her shoulders.

            "What's up?"

            Kairi turned around, frowning.  "I was going to wake her up like I did on all her birthdays…  Give her her first hug, you know?  Like always."  She leaned the side of her face against his chest.

            He held her, smirking a little.

            "She's a lady now, right?  All independent?"

            She shook her head.  "Whatever.  Honestly, when _I_ was her age…"

            And then Kairi was thinking about the sort of things she had done with Riku when she was about Nadia's age, and the woman began to worry all the more.

            Sora took a hold of Kairi's shoulders again, this time from the front, and stared down into her eyes.  "Don't worry about that sort of thing, Kairi.  The only guy I've seen Nadia around is Edgar, and even him she keeps at arm's length."

            Kairi pondered this and decided Sora was right.  She nodded first and then her lips spread into an open smile.  "She treats him pretty badly, doesn't she?"

            "That's Nadia for you."

            They laughed softly with each other.

            And then Kairi shut the door to her daughter's room, the room of the young woman who was no longer anybody's little girl.  She held Sora's hand and they left a piece of the past behind.

            Together.

~*~

            He waited patiently beneath the overhang of rock, out of sight.  His sandaled feet were planted firmly on the wet sand, and he ignored the rising tide that was starting to splash all the way up to his bare shins.  He had rolled up his khaki pants all the way to the knee because of this.  He could continue waiting, for a little longer at least.  He could hide so that she could be alone.

            He had been on his usual early morning walk when he had seen her emerge.  She'd been in a long white dress that billowed in accordance with the breeze.  The rising sun lit her from behind, illuminated her crown of dark red hair so it glowed like a halo.

            An angel…

            He had followed her, employing every bit of stealth within his body.  He did not want to disturb whatever she was doing, for it was obviously important.  He watched her from afar, as he so often did.

            But this morning had been different.  Special.

            Not only were her clothes unusual, but the way she carried herself was as well.  Her chin she held level and her head high.  Her arms and legs she kept very straight, and it was only then that he had a true appreciation for how tall a person she was.

            She had walked straight to the grove of trees were mist was congregating.  Everything seemed very quiet to him as he pursued her, save the crunching of his own footsteps.  Quieter, he told himself.

            But she was gone from sight and he felt it improper to investigate further.  He knew now where she was headed.

            The small gravestone surrounded by white flowers…  The room full of dust…  The tension in her family…  The constant wistful quality of her eyes…

             The pieces of the Nadia puzzle were falling into place.

~*~

            Sora insisted that evening that Edgar stay for the birthday dinner.  They had been engaged in more mock battles with Jalen, so all three 'knights' dropped their wooden 'swords' and peeled bark from their hands as they headed to the deck where Nadia was laying out a baby blue tablecloth.  Jalen ran in and gathered plates and silverware, and Kairi started bringing out the salad and bread.  Sora got the big pot of soup and, later, the main course of steak and fried seagull eggs.  Their guest retrieved glasses and a pitcher of lemonade with the help of Nadia's directions.

            There were only four chairs made for outside, so Jalen sat on a stool he dragged to the space between his mother and sister.  He swung his short legs back and forth, side to side, never tiring of it.

            It was a lot of commotion and trouble getting everything ready, but at last the table was set and dinner begun with a toast of lemonade.  Nadia was quiet and seemed reflective, Kairi seemed a bit sad, and Edgar seemed a bit surprised to know that today was anybody's birthday.  As for Jalen, the boy just kept swinging his legs.

            Sora, from Kairi's other side, leaned on his elbows and watched his son thoughtfully.  He wondered what his and Jalen's relationship would be in thirty or forty years…

            "Sora?"

            "Yes, Kairi?"

            "You want any salad, I said?"

            "Oh.  Yeah."  He watched his wife's face try to hold back the sympathy lurking just beneath the surface as she dished up a bowl of greens for him.  When she looked at him, he gazed back into her eyes, silently thanking her.

            Kairi understood his face perfectly.  She nodded.

            When all the food had been dished out, they began to eat hungrily.  All except Sora, whose fork lingered over the salad greens and his thoughts continued to drift.  He thought, _I can't go on like this.  I'll never make it.  Dad isn't dead.  Not yet.  Not for a long time, maybe.  Not for a long time…_

            Sora tuned back into the conversation, which currently was focused on Edgar.

            "And you enjoy making weapons?" Kairi was asking, her eyebrows raised a few centimeters higher than normal.

            "Not just weapons.  I enjoy creating—inventing, perhaps—new gadgets…  And working with machines."  The young man was smiling politely yet still acting slightly nervous.

            "Creating is all well and good.  But I don't like the idea of weapons," Kairi scolded in her most angry mothering tone.  But Sora saw that her eyes were soft and knew she held no malice for the boy.  He knew that Kairi was really getting to like Edgar, as he himself was.

            It was strange.  Sora and Kairi knew each other so well.  They knew what the other was thinking.  There were times when they had long conversations without exchanging one word.  It was…special.

            "Ach, _Jay_!"

            Nadia sat covered in soup and lemonade, both of which Jalen had managed to knock over in her direction.

            "Ac-Accident…" the little boy whispered, his blue eyes shiny and wide.

            Nadia's face was turned down to her soaked white dress that had been made expressly for this day.  Her shoulders were limp.

            She stood silently.

            "Sorry, big sister…"

            "I know, Jay," she said.  When she looked up, her face was not unlike the stone gray mask of a statue.  "I'm not hungry anyway.  Excuse me."

            "Wait, Nadia!  We haven't even gotten the cake out yet—" Kairi tried.

            Nadia just shook her head.  She abandoned her half-eaten dinner and lemonade and all the mess covering the baby blue tablecloth that was her and her mother's favorite, the one reserved for special occasions.  She disappeared into the house, her limbs straight as she marched.

            Those who remained at the table watched her go quietly and stayed that way as they finished their dinner.  Kairi threw her utensils onto her plate after only a minute or two.

            Sora always ate because there had been too many times when eating had been made impossible for him.  He knew moods had a tendency to stop people from taking care of themselves, and, now that he was on the other side of his adventure, he refused to be so foolish.

            Kairi began collecting the serving dishes and Edgar immediately hopped up to assist her.  Jalen crawled into his father's lap, upset for the trouble he'd manage to cause.

            "I think your sister was just a little moody," Sora told him.  "It's not your fault."

            "I jus' slipped…"

            "Hey.  It's okay.  You can apologize to her later.  We'll pick her some flowers—now how does that sound?"

            Jalen turned the idea over a couple of times in his five-year-old mind, and then nodded vigorously and smiled.  It had apparently passed the test.

            When his son went to pick out the prettiest blossoms the garden had to offer, Sora went to the kitchen to help finish cleaning up.  Kairi's face said it all, how heartbroken she felt to have the birthday dinner ruined.  Edgar had been working steadily and was already putting the dishes on the rack to air dry.

            Sora embraced his wife and promised to fix everything, although this he said with doubt lingering in his mind.

            "I should go," Edgar said when he had all the dishes drying.  "Thank you for the wonderful dinner."

            Kairi looked at him remorsefully.  "You don't want a piece of cake?"

            "Maybe I'll come back later to take you up on that kind offer," the young man told her, bowing.  "Thank you again."

            Sora and Kairi watched Edgar through the glass as he said goodbye to Jalen and then walked down the hill toward the village.  Jalen came in shortly after with some large orange and red flowers clasped tightly in his stubby fingers.

            "Ready to go?" his father asked.

            "Yup!"

            They headed upstairs to Nadia's room.  Kairi followed at a hesitant distance.

            Jalen knocked excitedly at the door.

            "Jay?" came Nadia's muffled voice from inside.

            "Big sister!"

            There was a pause and then the door creaked open about a quarter of the way.  Nadia's face was a little pink and her eyes were only half-opened.  She had changed into a light blue t-shirt and a khaki skirt that went to her knees.  She'd pulled her hair into a ponytail on the back of her head.

            She caught sight of Sora standing behind Jalen and her body stiffened.  Then her brother pushed the miniature bouquet up into her face.  She sniffled a little as a few petals ventured into her nostrils.

            "For me, Jay?"  Nadia took the flowers and rubbed her nose with the back of her free hand.  "Thank you."

            Both her words and her expression seemed rather flat.

            "Happy birthday…"  Jalen's lower lip was trembling.

            Sora put his big hand on his son's shoulder.  "He's sorry for what he did.  It was an accident."

            "I know."  Nadia's arm with the bouquet went limp and the flowers hung close to the floor.  "I'm not mad at him.  I'm just…tired."  She sighed.  Her eyes didn't meet Sora's.  She only stared vacantly into space.

            Jalen looked up into his father's face desperately.

            "Run along now, Jalen," Sora told him.  "You can go play in your room."

            The boy left, sniffling all the way.  Kairi emerged from the stairwell and followed her son to his bedroom.

            It was just the two of them left now.

            Sora had seen his wife and son's faces.  "Nadia, I know you're upset about the soup and everything, but it's over now.  You've made both your mother and your brother pretty upset, you know—"

            "I'm not mad about the soup," she replied through clenched teeth.

            "Your mother worked hard making all that food for you—and you haven't even seen her cake yet."

            "Look, whatever!  I'll have some cake tomorrow, okay?"

            "Okay, but you owe Kairi and apology when this is all done."

            "Fine!  I'll say, 'Mom, sorry for being your daughter!  Sorry for not being what you and Sora wanted!'  Is that good enough?  Is it?"

            "You're sixteen now, Nadia.  Maybe you should start acting like it."

            "And how exactly should I go about that?"

            "Maybe you could start by thinking about how other people feel before you go and do something so selfish—"

            Nadia swung at him, but Sora's reflexes were as sharp as ever.  He stopped her attack a few inches from his face, grabbing her wrist tightly.

            The girl turned her eyes up into his, glaring with red-hot anger.  She fought to get her hand free and, most likely, hit him again, but he was too strong.

            Still, her strength was surprising.

            "Damn it, you're one to talk!" she sputtered.  "Where do _you_ get off telling _me_ not to be selfish?  What a joke, you fucking hypocrite!"

            "Don't you use that kind of language with me—"

            "Damn you!" she screamed, bringing up her leg and connecting it with the back of his knee.  "Don't tell me what to do!  Don't try and act like you're my father!"

            The anger in her eyes glowed hotter and hotter, transforming into seething hatred.

            Sora still held her tightly, but, on the inside, he felt off-balance with shock.  He wasn't aware she knew how to fight.  He didn't know she was so strong.  But the most frightening thing was the hatred in her eyes, burning solely for him.

            She stopped wrestling with him so much and just stood there, shuddering.  Sweat glistened on her forehead.

            "Nadia, I'm sorry, but I'm the only father you've got."

            "And whose fault is that, huh?" she asked.  Hollow laughter followed.  "Who's the one, huh?"  She used her free hand to punch him in the stomach, dodging his defense as she spoke.  "Who's the one that—showed up—just—to ruin—his life?"

            He finally restrained her, grabbing her other wrist.  She was left to kick at him.

            Sora felt Kairi watching them, but he did not turn his head to acknowledge her presence.

            Nadia just snickered, and it was eerie.  "That's right, isn't it?  He's dead because of you.  He suffered for years because of you."

            "_Nadia!_" Kairi cried from the sidelines in disbelief.  "How can you say such awful things?"

            "Because they're true, Mom.  Do me a favor and stay out of this—unless you want me to bring up how you and Sora collaborated to make Papa's life miserable!"  She brought up her knee and slammed it into Sora's stomach.

            "_That's enough!_"

            Sora slammed Nadia against the wall, suspending her by her wrists a few inches above the ground.  He could no longer control his movements.  Reflexes from years of fighting in the darkness had taken over.  Someone important to him had been threatened, and he was turning into the animal he once had been…

            Nadia didn't cry out.  She instead bit her lip so hard that bright red blood trickled down her chin.  She was staring up at his face with defiance and hatred and anger and mockery.

            "Sora, no!  No!" Kairi was shrieking, pulling frantically at the man's arms.  But she was no match for him.  "You're hurting her!  Please no, Sora!  Stop it!"

            But somehow Kairi didn't exist at the moment, at least the Kairi who couldn't bear to see any harm come to her daughter.

            The animal within Sora was thinking only of how the woman he loved more than the world had been wounded in the heart by this wretched creature before him—how Kairi had gone through pain each and every day because of Nadia.

            And the wretched creature was smiling now, even though a few tears of pain escaped her eyes and slid down her reddened cheeks.  She was mocking him with her grin.

            "So this is the bastard you really are, Sora," Nadia whispered harshly.  The blood dribbling from her lip splattered on him when she spoke like that, spoke like a snake.  "I knew there was a person like this lurking underneath.  Someone who was so terrible to my father."

            He stared at Nadia with frigid eyes.  But the more Sora looked at her face, the more he saw Riku's eyes gazing back at him.

            Sora gradually loosened his hold on her wrists and Nadia slid down to stand on the floor.  She was wearing a triumphant smile.

            The human Sora was beginning to break through.  He would not raise his hand to strike her, as the animal within might have done moments before.

            The rest of the world gradually rematerialized around him.  Kairi was on the floor choking back sobs.  Jalen was watching from the stairs, his eyes big and fearful.  It was dark in the house now; clouds must have moved in over the island.

            Nadia was flexing her bruised wrists, trying to show that no, they didn't hurt at all.

            Then Kairi came to her feet.

            "Nadia…are you all right…?"

            Nadia just scoffed at her mother and went into her bedroom.  She began to throw a few items into a bag—among them her father's old shirt she had used as pajamas when she was a child.

            "Nadia, honey…  Where are you going?  Nadia, answer me."

            Nadia slung the bag across her shoulder.  Her eyes were focused on a point past her mother.  "You don't deserve any answers from me."

            "Nadia, I'm your mother!"

            Nadia glared at Sora, her eyes still burning with contempt.  "As long as you are _his_ wife, you are not _my_ mother."

            Kairi gasped and stumbled a little as Nadia pushed past her to get out the door.

            "I can't stay here.  I can't take it."

            Kairi reached after her daughter's retreating form.  Nadia didn't turn around, but said one last thing.

            "'Bye, Jay…"

            When they heard the door slam a floor below, Kairi turned her face up to Sora's.

            Her expression was one of sheer horror.

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I'm baaaackkk.  I had a great time at my camp, the Asian and Pacific Studies Institute.  I learned so much…!  Asia is such a fascinating place.  There is so much to learn about every country in our world.  I wish the U.S. wasn't so self-centered…

A big thank you to everyone who was concerned about my depressive episode.  Mood swings are nasty things, I tell you what. .

Hope you enjoyed this chapter.


	6. Family Feuds

~*~

            "Nadia?"

            The girl looked up from her place on Selphie's couch.  She was bent over, cradling a pillow against her chest.  Her face was contorted with a mixture of anger, sadness, and fatigue.

            Edgar lingered several feet away.  The room in which they stood, the house's sitting room, was very dark; no one had bothered with a lantern.  The only light came from beneath the kitchen door, which was shut.

            Nadia only hugged the pillow closer to herself.

            She looked positively wounded.

            "Would you mind if I sat down?"

            "Do what you want."

            Edgar moved awkwardly to sit on the couch, but he chose a place at the very end.  A good distance lay between the two young people.  It was quiet and dark.  He could barely discern the outline of her trembling form.

            He finally decided to break the silence.

            "Tidus let me in."

            "Ah."

            "I went to your house to see how things were doing and, well…"  Edgar shook his head.  He was still somewhat in disbelief.  "Your mother is really frantic.  She was worried that something might have happened to you after you just walked out."

            "I couldn't stay in that house any longer," Nadia said coldly.  "Anyway, she has Sora to lean on."

            "Really?  The impression I had was that those two aren't speaking."

            The girl had nothing to say to this.

            Edgar reclined, putting one arm across the padded armrest and the other over the back of the couch.  "My parents and I are not really much better."

            Nadia turned her head slightly.  Her cheek was cushioned in the pillow.  She seemed willing to listen, so Edgar took a deep breath as he prepared to elaborate.  He hadn't bothered thinking about his parents since he had left them over a month ago.

            "You know…  All of the other islands are so much different than this place.  There aren't any cities here…only a village.  No one worries about having a lot of money.  Everyone wants only enough to take care of his family.  There is neither greed nor ruthless competition.

            "It is so…_easygoing_ here."

            She continued to listen silently.

            "I really enjoy it."

            "Most of the kids say it's boring.  I told you before that there aren't any sights."

            He smiled.  "I remember."

            But he was thinking about the wonderful things he had seen on the island.  She was among them.  She…she was the most important.

            To see her in pain made him hurt too.

            "But what do sights have to do with your parents?" she pressed, her words partially muffled as they passed through pillowcase and feather.

            "There isn't greed here, as I said.  However, it thrives everywhere else.  All around.  People care more about exchanging currency favorably than talking to the person with whom they're bartering."

            "Yeah…?"

            "Well, my parents fit this profile perfectly.  All they concern themselves with is money—and power."

            As he spoke, he felt his cheeks flush with anger.  He harbored so much resentment toward his parents' selfish ways.  He worried how violently he might release it.  So he set his eyes on Nadia's silhouette and tried to remain calm.

            "My father is the owner of the only major private school.  Have you heard of it?  Figaro Academy?"

            "I think I might have seen it when we visited Sora's parents…  Huge stone building—kinda like a castle?"

            "That's it."

            "So what's wrong with a school?  We don't even have schools around here."

            "Education is fine.  It's what my parents do with their wealth and position that bothers me.  My father has a place of prominence in the community, and he flaunts this fact every chance he gets.  At times my mother acts likes she's a queen or something.  She even looks down her nose at the mayor's wife."

            "So you're ashamed of them because of how they act?"

            "I have a right to be ashamed because of what they _do_.  Those two have so much money and all they can think to do with it is spend it on themselves.  If you want an example, I have one for you:  the only reason they donated money to the city once was so that they could have a park named after them!"

            She seemed a little startled and Edgar realized his temper had gotten the best of him and he was yelling.  He settled back into his seat, apologizing profusely.  He used one hand to hold his forehead, maybe to hide the expression of pure disgust written on his face.

            "The worst part is…they expect me to be just like them."

            "So you left?"

            "I could not stand it anymore!  I finished school and I was out of there for good.  I did not want their money—I did not want to take away their sole joy in life," he scoffed.  "I wanted to become an inventor and actually _do_ something with myself that could benefit other people."

            Nadia sat up a little, allowing the pillow to slip from her chest down into her lap.  "What kind of things do you like to invent?"

            Edgar recognized that he was cracking her shell, if only by a little.  A smile spread across his lips.  The man groped for a lamp and found one on the table beside him.  He pulled out one of his recent inventions and snapped it between his fingers.  A small flame sprouted at the end of the small metal canister.

            Nadia gasped in surprise, watching carefully as he lit the wick inside the lamp and then extinguished the fire within his palm with another flick of the wrist.  A modest amount of light flooded over them, and Edgar saw that Nadia's eyes were scrunched up and red from crying.

            "Thank you," she said quietly.  "For telling me your story.  I wish I could tell you mine…"  She held up one hand to brush away some hair stuck to her face.

            His brow creased and his cheeks grew redder when he saw the deep bruises circling her wrist.

            "Nadia, who did this to you?"

            "Oh," she said dully, lifting up her other arm.  "Look: a matching set."

            Edgar stood.  "Was it Sora?"

            She nodded absently, inspecting the black-purple wounds.

            The man clenched his fist.  "I can see why your mother isn't speaking with him, then," he said as his anger mounted.  Had Sora and Nadia merely engaged in a screaming match, forgiveness would have been simple…

            But Sora had inflicted serious harm.  He could not be easily forgiven.

            "Selphie went out to get me some ointment," Nadia said, ignoring Edgar's transforming demeanor.  "I'll be fine.  I fought back, anyway."  She smiled to herself.  "Sora was really surprised by that, I think."

            Edgar stood in front of her like a sentry.

            "C'mon, sit down already.  You wouldn't want to make Sora really mad anyway.  He was…scary."  She wasn't smiling anymore.  In fact, she had gone a little pale.

            He relented and sat back down, next to her this time.  He pulled her arm across his own to examine her wrist.

            "It was like he became a different person.  I was frightened as Hell," Nadia admitted quietly.  "The look in his eyes…  And the way he slammed me against the wall—"

            "The way he _what_—!"  Edgar was already launching himself from the couch again, but Nadia grabbed for his shirt, wincing as her fingers wrapped around the cloth.

            "_Oh_, watch your wrist…"

            The girl was holding it against her chest, her face crinkled in pain.  "Damn it," she growled, biting down hard on her already scabbed lip.

            "Nadia, I know you said some terrible things to Sora, and perhaps you even fought him—but there was no excuse for him to hurt you!"

            Bright light flooded across the room.

            "I agree with that."

            It was Selphie, entering from the kitchen.  She had brown hair of medium length and wore a yellow shirt and loose cream-colored pants.  In her hand was a small glass jar of off-white cream.

            She approached Nadia.  "Sorry it took me so long.  I stopped to talk to your mother for a few minutes.  I told her that you would be staying with us for a while."

            Nadia turned her head to the side.

            "She needs to know where you are.  Is that all right?"

            "I don't care," the girl replied.

            "Well, that's okay, honey.  Now give me your wrists."  She took Nadia's right arm and began to apply the ointment.  Nadia shuddered a little.  "It tingles at first," Selphie told her.  "But it'll help you heal faster."

            Nadia clenched her teeth as the treatment progressed.  Edgar's heart lurched with every small grimace of pain that appeared on her face.  He himself had never experienced such a bad bruise.  He could only imagine how sore it was.

            "Edgar," Selphie said as she switched to working on Nadia's other arm.  "I know all you want to do right now is punch Sora's lights out.  I understand; I felt the exact same way when I was over there.  But you can't, all right?  That family has just been ripped apart, and Kairi doesn't need any more stress—not with the baby coming and everything."

            "But it isn't due yet," Nadia interjected, frowning.

            Selphie sighed softly.  "I'm only saying she doesn't need more stress.  If you want to stay here, Nadia, I'm fine with that.  Tidus and I will take care of you for as long as you need."

            "Thanks, Selphie."

            But Edgar was grumbling to himself.  The idea of punching Sora right between the eyes was very appealing at that moment.

            Selphie finished applying the ointment and rubbed the excess from her hands onto a towel, which she then placed across Nadia's lap.  She sat down, somewhat heavily, in an armchair across from the other two.

            It was quiet then, the only sound muffled footsteps overhead.  Selphie explained that Tidus was probably putting their daughter, Rinny, to bed, and that the girl could be pretty insistent about staying up late.

            There was a clock in the sitting room and it announced the arrival of the eleventh hour.

            "I should be going," Edgar decided.  He stood.

            "You're going home, right?" Selphie wanted to know, eyeing him.

            "Yes, m'lady," he told her tiredly.  "Straight home."  His eyes went to Nadia's shiny wrists, which were resting on the white towel in her lap.  She had her head turned down so it was impossible to know how she was feeling.

            "I'll show you out," Selphie announced.  She waited for Edgar to give Nadia a quick goodbye (one which failed to conjure a response), and then took him through the kitchen to the back door.

            "Thank you for having me," Edgar told her, bowing his head quickly.  He walked out into the dark night.

            "Wait—!"

            He stopped.

            "Please don't make any trouble," Selphie said quietly, appealing to him with motherly green eyes.  She was leaning out, leaning on the doorknob.  "All of them have had too much already."

            "I know."  He really wanted to defend Nadia.  His heart cried out to do so.

            But he could not.

            "I won't do anything," Edgar said, making himself promise it on the inside.

            "Come over around lunchtime tomorrow, all right?  Maybe she'll be feeling better by then and we can sort things out."

            "Maybe."

~*~

            Sora stood in the kitchen doorway, his eyes resting on Kairi's back.  She was sitting at the counter on a tall stool, bending over the fumes of an incredibly strong cup of tea.  She had not spoken to him for hours.

            Not since Nadia had walked out.

            He knew that his wife could sense his presence.  Their bond was too strong for her not to feel him watching.  But he could not sense her thoughts tonight.  She was working at shutting him out.

            "Kairi?" he tried finally.  Because she had allowed him to do so, he had stood behind her for some time.  It must have been forty minutes now.  He just wanted to be as close to her as possible.

            She did not even flinch.

            "Kairi, I think you should try and go to bed.  I can sleep down here if you want."

            The woman sipped some tea.

            "C'mon, Kairi.  Take care of yourself.  Maybe you can have Jalen sleep next to you, okay?"

            Silence.

            "Kairi, go to bed."

            "Don't you dare give me orders!" she cried, whipping her body around so fast that she knocked the ceramic mug across the counter.  It hit the wall and shattered, sending out sharp splinters and bursts of boiling liquid.

            There were tears streaming down Kairi's cheeks in thick rivers.  Her eyes themselves were red, as though she had been crying for hours.

            She probably had.

            "Kai—"

            "Sora, I don't even know who you are anymore!"

            It felt as though a weight had just been thrown against his chest.  He stumbled backward a few steps.  He felt…terrified.  Surely the feeling was evident on his face.

            "How could you have done that to my daughter?"

            _Because, Kairi…there's something horrible inside of me…  Something I thought was dead…_

            Kairi's mouth opened slightly as she groped for words.  She was breathing hard.  "Y-You weren't the person I know!  You were a monster!"

            _A monster.  That's right.  I'm a monster, Kairi._

            The tears kept flowing.  She was standing now, but keeping a good distance from him.

            "Our family is ruined," she murmured over and over.  She turned her face upward.  She looked so frightened.  "Everything I ever cared about is ruined!"

            "Kairi, _no_…"

            "Nadia's right, isn't she?  Riku…  Everything she said about Riku was right!"

            "_No_.  He was sick, Kairi.  You _know_ we didn't kill him."

            "We might as well have!"

            "Why the Hell are you talking like this?  Stop it, Kairi—"

            "You know it's true!"  She waved at him a finger filled with accusation.  "The two of us and Riku—we ruined his life!"

            _No, don't talk like this.  Please don't!_

            "We—ruined—everything…"  She was sinking down to the tile floor, now, her back sliding against the wall.  Her eyes were huge and red as they stared upward, begging for answers.  "I couldn't love him back," she whispered.  "Not the way he loved me..."

            The wounds from eight years ago were being violently ripped open in both their hearts.  The blood…the memories…  Spilling everywhere.

            "Selfish!  Selfish!  Selfish!" Kairi screamed over and over again until she started having dry heaves.

            _I'm a monster…  Look what I've done to everyone I've cared about…  I should just die…!_

            Sora could only watch as his wife suffered through so much emotional trauma.

            _I'm the reason for everyone's pain.  I should never have come back here.  Everyone I care about is suffering—or already dead.  I don't deserve to live.  I just bring pain everywhere I go, don't I?_

            "Kairi, I'm leaving," Sora spoke softly.  "You and Nadia never have to see me again."

            She stopped coughing and froze in her crumpled position on the floor.

            "I'm sorry.  I never meant for things to be this way."

            "…Sora…"

            "I have to get out of here."

            "Sora!"

            "Forgive me, Kairi…for everything."  He hoped that someday she could understand that he had never meant any harm.  "I'm leaving now."

            He walked slowly toward the door.  His cheeks were wet.

            "_Sora!_"

            _This is it_, he thought._  The end of everything_…

            Sora could hear Kairi stumbling, falling against the counter, her hands racing across the table.  There was a great _thump_ and he looked back, instinctively, to see her collapsed on the floor, gripping her belly with both hands.

            "The baby…"

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	7. Something Inside

~*~

            It was eleven o'clock on that cloudy morning, one dim as twilight, when Edgar arrived at Selphie and Tidus's modest house.  He had been stalking around his own small hut since dawn, scooping up various newspapers or books from his collection and then discarding them just as fast.  He tried working on his latest invention, but it was in vain.  He hadn't had the amount of concentration needed for such a delicate task.

            He hadn't had any concentration at all.

            There was probably a large indentation in the wall near his desk where he had released his frustration through a series of punches.

            Someone he cared about was injured—and he could do nothing at all about it?

            Inside his heart had been aching.  It wasn't akin to the anger he had harbored for his parents.  It was a different feeling.  Against his parents the one he had been protecting was himself, from a realm he viewed as evil and corrupt.  The feeling now wasn't about him at all.

            Eleven was the time he had decided on.  Some people ate lunch as early as that.  Right?

            He rapped the door with his knuckles three precisely spaced times.

            Knock.  Knock.  Knock.

            No response.  He waited around two minutes and then knocked twice more.

            He went around to the back.  No response.  No one home…

            At last Edgar stopped to listen.  The man heard nothing.  This sound set him off at a jog for the big house on the hill, the one that was partially a living tree, the one set apart from the main village.  The quiet resounded loudly in his ears, burying the crunching and sliding noises of his feet hitting against the sand at closer and closer intervals.

            He pounded on the door of the kitchen.  The curtains were drawn over the huge windows on either side of him.  It was dark and quiet inside as well.  The only sign was a flickering light in one of the rooms within, a sign that allowed the dying hope inside his heart to keep itself from the grave.

            It seemed no one would answer him.  He touched the knob and in a moment found himself stumbling inside.  "Hello?"

            "It's Edgar," he heard a voice say from the next room.

            "Has something happened?" Edgar asked, and it was a foolish question.  If nothing had happened, why would Nadia be sitting on her own couch with her head down—be back in her own house and not overwhelmed with seething contempt by having to share the same breathing air as Sora?  Why would Jalen be occupying the rest of the couch in a horizontal position, stirring frequently as if from a nightmare?

            Nadia glanced up, her expression somewhat one of permanent astonishment.  She was pale and red-eyed.  Sleep-deprived and upset.

            "It's too early," she murmured into her hands.

            "What do you mean?" Edgar pressed gently, approaching her and touching her shoulder with sympathy.

            It was of no use; Nadia's head had gone back down.  She was gripping the sides of her head tightly.  A few of her fingers stuck up through masses of dark red hair.

            "Somethin's wrong with Aunt Kairi's baby," said a young female voice.  Edgar's eyes searched for the owner, and quickly found her.  Crawling out of a sleeping bag in the darkened corner was a beanpole of a young girl with a mop of brown hair and a handful of freckles splashed over a thin, round face.

            "Rinny?" Edgar wondered, recalling the name of Selphie and Tidus's daughter.

            She nodded.

            "Daddy went ta get the doctor."

            "When was that?"

            "Last night…  Middle of the night," Rinny lisped quietly, as if remembering something unpleasant.  She reached under her thick, short hair and scratched behind one ear, tilting her head to the side.  She was studying Edgar, he realized, perhaps to see if he was trustworthy or not.

            "So the doctor wasn't on the island..."

            "No.  Daddy took his boat."

            Edgar approached her with slow steps and crouched down.  As part of his final years of schooling, he had worked with the younger children as an assistant teacher.  He was accustomed to their shyness.

            "It was scaaawie," the girl moaned quietly.  "Poundin' on the door, shoutin'.  Uncle Sora came ta our house…middle of the night…"

            Edgar nodded his head to encourage her.

            "…I woke up—well, I was just goin' ta sleep, but I'm s'pposed ta be asleep by nine, Mommy said—you won't tell Mommy, will you?"

            "No."

            "I like ta look at my books with Daddy at night when he's home," she explained desperately.  "He reads ta me."

            "I won't tell your mother.  I promise.  Now what happened last night?"

            "Ev'rybody was yellin' real loud."  She clasped her hands over her ears to demonstrate.  "They said 'Kairi's in twouble!' and ev'rybody was runnin' around.  Uncle Sora was yellin' at Daddy ta get the doctor an' then Mommy was too and Daddy ran out ta get his boat and Mommy took me here."

            "So Sora and your mother are in with Kairi now?"

            Rinny pointed at the bottom of the stairs.  "Up there.  Mommy said I had ta stay downstairs."

            Edgar straightened.

            "_Hello_?  I'm back!  We're here!" cried a deep male voice from the kitchen after Edgar heard the back door creak and then slam shut again.

            "Daddy!"

            Tidus came into the light, breathing hard.  His deeply tanned skin had a distinct pink undertone and sweat sparkled all over his naked chest, arms, and sandaled feet.  A pair of shorts, his only item of clothing, was soaked with sweat, too—or seawater.  The man smelled strongly of both.

            Edgar realized that the blonde man must have made the trip between islands in less than half the usual time, and with only the light of a flickering lantern to guide him—at best.  His body, sweaty and pink, was evidence of the effort.

            Behind Tidus was a cloaked, balding man with black hair and a large bag.  His eyes were narrowed slightly as he examined his surroundings, but his lips failed to produce a word.

            Something thundered on the stairs.  Edgar looked over to see it who the frantic person was.

            _Sora…_

            "You're finally back—Please, Doctor!  Hurry!  This way!  Right up these stairs here!  Hurry, my wife's—"  He was already turning around and hurrying back up, gesturing madly.  "Hurry!"

            The doctor made a trail of quick, short steps to the stairway and began to climb, bending his knees at precise right angles. Tidus followed far less robotically, his body drooping with fatigue.

            Rinny looped her arms around Edgar's leg as the noise upstairs mounted.  Talking and yelling and the pounding of footsteps.  Edgar checked the couch and yes, Nadia was still unresponsive.  Jalen's face was set in a deep frown, but his eyes were still closed and the lids fluttered as in sleep.

            Finally, there was more stumbling at the bottom of the stairs.  It was Sora, pulling his hand through long brown hair over and over.  His face was pale and his eyes huge and disbelieving.

            It was then that Nadia moved—flinched—and not a second before.

            "—and don't you come back up here until you can do something useful!" Selphie's voice came shrieking down the stairs.

            Sora paused to stare over his shoulder for a moment before walking into the room and falling into a chair.

            "Is Aunt Kairi gonna be okay?"  Rinny was the first who dared to speak, still squeezing Edgar's leg.

            "She…"  Sora ran his fingers through his hair again, serving to make it even more unkempt (if that was even possible).  He looked at Edgar, then, and the boy didn't understand quite why.  Perhaps because the question Rinny asked was the same as the one in Edgar's eyes.

            Sora explained in broken sentences that Kairi seemed to have prematurely gone into labor, but not much was happening.  She was going back and forth between being awake and asleep, but never appeared to fully be either.  Selphie, who knew something of midwifery and had assisted during Jalen's birth, was doing all she could for Kairi, but there was not much more to try without a doctor.

            This had been the situation for over ten hours.

            Tidus came down, saying that Selphie had sent him for boiled water.  He disappeared into the kitchen once Sora told him where the kettle was.

            "It's more than a month too early," Sora murmured.

            _Perhaps all that stress building up was too much for Kairi's body to take_, Edgar thought.  _That means Selphie was right, and…_

            "Damn, it's all my fault," Nadia growled softly, sounding a bit like a wounded lion.

            Sora stood.  He shook his head and insisted, "No.  No, it's everything _I_ did.  I should never have come back to this island."

            "I didn't even think about the baby when I blew up like that…"

            "All of this happened because of me!"

            "No, it was me!"

            "Nadia, it's my fault—"

            "Will you two just _listen to yourselves?!_" screamed an angry voice.

            It was Tidus, still exhausted, but this time breathing hard with anger.  He was clenching a wooden bucket of steaming water in one heavily blistered fist, and looked very much like he would like to throw it on the two arguing people in front of him.

            "I can't believe the two of you, sitting here bickering about whose fault it was!  How selfish can you get?  You're so wrapped up in self-pity!"

            "Tidus, we were only—"

            "Do you even _realize_ that we could lose Kairi and the baby any moment now?"

            "Mom," moaned Nadia softly, hugging herself.

            Selphie's high-pitched commands were back.  "Tidus!  We need that water right _now_!"

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Sorry this chapter is a little short.  The last two were longish, so…


	8. Darkening Dreams

~*~

            There were times when she thought life too unreal to be reality.  There were times when she was not sure if she was dreaming or not.  Could things really be as terrible as they were?  Or was today just a nightmare?

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            Was her mother going to die?

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            What about the unborn baby—her little brother or sister?

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            When she clamped her hands over her ears tightly enough, she could drive out all the noise around her.  She wanted to rid herself of every sound, but there was still the buzzing of her own thoughts.  When these were quieted, there remained the steady pulse, the beating of her own heart, echoing inside her ears.

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            Never ceasing, sometimes speeding up and, at other times, slowing down.  If she concentrated hard enough, it was almost a drum commanded by a skilled musician with a steady hand.

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            Her eyes were squeezed shut.  Inside her mind was displayed a scene of dancing whites and grays and blacks.  She kept a tight leash on her imagination, lest it show her something more human than these swirling colors.

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            Her own little world.  She was in her own world.  There was no one else.  There was no chaos around her.  Swirling colors and the steady beating of her heart.  That was all.

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            No.  No!  Someone was shaking her.  Someone trying to rouse her from her self-imposed seclusion—her paradise where there was no trouble.  There was no one around to be in trouble.

            _Thump.  Thump.  Thump._

            Farewell, heartbeat…  The real world had broken through.

~*~

            "Nadia?  Nadia!"  Edgar continued to shake her.  He grabbed her arms and pulled her hands from her ears.  She put up quite a struggle.  He had to employ a great deal of his strength.

            "_What_?" she growled in a low voice when she was finally pulled from her reverie.

            Jalen moaned and wiped his eyes.  He was awake, too.  Everyone was awake now.

            The clock in the study announced it was two.

            Nadia took one hand and pulled a mesh of hair away from her face, pulling it back to reveal a dull expression.  She leaned back and took her little brother against her, hugged him to her side.  The boy, trembling, responded by throwing his arms around his sister.

            Edgar took a seat for the first time in nearly two hours.  He sat on the couch next to Nadia and Jalen.  His aching legs thanked him dearly.

            "Well, what is it?  What did you bother me for?"  Nadia looked around the room.  "Where'd Sora go?"

            "To see your mother," Edgar replied.  "You are going next."

            She turned her head toward him slowly and mechanically.  "Nothing's happened…?"

            _She really was oblivious to all that went on in the past three hours?_

            "Nadia, they delivered the baby."

            "Is it—?"

            "Very small…"

            "But—?"

            "Still alive, as of now."

            "And Mom?"

            "Selphie came down and told us that they are both doing all right for the time being, but that it is not certain when this could change…"

            "What's gonna happen ta Mommy, big sister?" Jalen whispered fearfully.

            "I don't know, Jay…" Nadia told him, her words and expression echoing his uncertainty.

            "You can go see for yourself," Sora said from the edge of the room.  It was impossible to judge the situation using the blank look on his face.

            "Mom!" Nadia cried.  She left Jalen with Edgar and ran for the stairs.  Her path took her right by Sora but, as far as Edgar could see, the two failed to exchange any signal whatsoever.

            Sora continued to stand there, and Edgar continued sitting.  There was nothing either of them could do.

            Fate had taken the wheel now.

~*~

            It was dim. It was cloudy outside and, on top of that, the curtains were drawn.  There was only a candle's wavering light.

            Kairi was alone in the room when Nadia entered.  The older woman was lying—sleeping, perhaps—in the middle of the large bed.  The candle was on a table directly behind and slightly above her, so it cast long shadows under her eyes, nose, and mouth.  These dark shadows leapt across her gentle face.

            Nadia froze where she was, her hand lingering on the knob of the door she had just closed.  Half of her wanted to open it back up and run out and scream.  The girl could not help but recall her father's tranquil expression when he died….

            Had her mother left this realm to join him?

            She very much wanted to scream, but it was far too quiet to scream.  She would not dare to shatter the peace of that darkened bedroom.  She instead made silent steps to Kairi and knelt on the floor beside the bed.

            Kairi's breathing was either very faint or nonexistent.

            "Mom…"

            Sora would have said something if she were dead, right?

            "Mom, please be here…"

            He would have warned her, right?

            "Mom, please wake up."

            Right?

            "_Please_…"

            Kairi's eyelids fluttered and she turned her head just slightly.  Her lips opened into a tired smile.

            "Mom!"

            "Nadia," Kairi breathed softly.  "It's wonderful to see you."

            "Oh, _Mom_…"  Salty tears were spilling down Nadia's cheeks as warm relief flooded into her heart.  "I thought you might…  I didn't know if…  If…"

            "I know, honey."

            The echoes of darkness were still dancing under her eyes, her nose, her mouth…

            "I just wanted to tell you I was wrong to say that horrible stuff before," Nadia blurted out all at once.  She choked back sobs.  "You will…always be…my mother…"

            "Nadia…"  Kairi's eyes sparkled.

            "No matter what, Mom!"  She paused, holding one hand near her mouth.  "I'm so sorry for what I said.  I got carried away.  I didn't even think about you and the baby…  I wish I could take it all back now, but I can't.  I'm so sorry!"  She collapsed into the bed, her head buried in the comforter.  She felt Kairi's hand on her head, straightening the hair with motherly affection.

            "Some of what you said is true, Nadia…"

            The girl straightened, pushing herself up with her elbows.

            "Sit by me," her mother directed, indicating the spot next to her.  Nadia obeyed, sitting with her body twisted slightly so her long legs touched the floor but her torso was still angled towards Kairi.

            "Mom…?"

            "You know, Nadia, love is…a complex thing.  In my life I have experienced so much love…for so many people.  But the feeling is unique with each person.  Even my feelings toward you and Jalen are different.  I don't love one of you more than the other, but my feelings aren't identical.  Do you understand, Nadia?  Maybe just a little?"

            She nodded.

            "If I were to sum up love in one word, I would have to choose 'complex,'" Kairi said next, more to herself than to her daughter.

            Nadia nodded once more.  She realized then how much more life experience her mother had, and she felt a little humbled by it.

            "There's something else you have to understand about me, Nadia, and that is that I'm really a very weak person.  I'm not like you or your father or Sora.  I'm not so strong-willed.  I'm weak…I need other people to help me.  And I'm really quite selfish."  She smiled, then, a humble smile of reflection.

            The reflection deepened, and Nadia knew her mother was traveling back to a different time.

            "From the day I first came to this island, I always relied on Sora and Riku.  We played together constantly—hey, I was a kid once, too, you know.  I thought the endless summer days would last forever.  I never really considered that things could change.  Maybe I didn't want them to, and that's why I tried ignoring it when they actually did…

            "Riku was a different person when he was fifteen.  What he wanted more than anything was to get off this tiny island and see the world—actually, he wanted to see _different_ worlds.  We had this…ridiculous plan to take a raft to another world.  Riku was the mastermind behind it, and Sora got excited about any kind of adventure.  I went along with the two of them because I didn't want to be left behind.  I believed that, if the three of us were still together, nothing would go too terribly wrong.  I thought we could always come home and everything would go back to the way it used to be.  Who knows how long I continued to feel that way…

             "I was blind, then.  I didn't see that Riku was changing until it was too late.  I didn't understand about the Darkness then.  You just _can't_ understand it until you've experienced it…  I guess I'm still pretty ignorant, too, at least compared to Riku and Sora…"

            Nadia continued listening.  She had heard something of the Darkness and Sora and Kairi's adventure, but never really processed it as more than a fairy tale.

            "But…things _did_ go terribly wrong.  Our world was swallowed up by the Darkness, and I almost lost my heart.  Sora saved me and kept my heart safe.  Riku was corrupted at that time and taken over by an awful man called Ansem.  I think I've told you this before…"

            Kairi recounted most of the important details of her adventure and how the worlds were saved.

            "There's something I've never told you, Nadia:  what happened after the Door was sealed.  Your father was trapped in the Darkness for two years and he…he continued to suffer...  Finally, he made it back here.  Sora was still missing, though, and that's how this whole…ordeal started.

            "Like I told you, I'd always relied on Sora and Riku.  I came back to the island when it was restored, but I didn't have either one of them.  I was lonely and scared.  I began to think they would never return and I would be alone forever.  I told you, Nadia…  I'm a weak person.  When Riku finally came back, he was still scarred from his ordeal in the Darkness.  He told me he didn't remember any of it, but I suspect there were parts that haunted him, at least in his nightmares.  There were times when he cried out in his sleep…a piercing scream...  It broke my heart.

            "At that time, we were both hurting.  We leaned on each other and grew very close.  Riku took care of me.  He was always there to protect me when I was afraid.  I think Riku had always cared for me, but I had been closer to Sora before because of how Riku had been when he had was being polluted by the Darkness.  But now all I had was Riku and all I knew was Riku.  I felt madly and passionately in love with him.  For a short time we shared something beautiful…

            _But then you abandoned him_, Nadia couldn't help but think as she tried to stop her face from revealing her resentment.  _He was devoted to you, Mom.  And what you did to him in return…_

            "I had tried to tell myself Sora wasn't coming back.  Every year that passed hurt a little more because I was still hoping he would return.  I wanted to bury that hope so it couldn't hurt me anymore.  I tried to forget Sora, or come to terms with his death, but I just couldn't.  I struggled so much with this.

            "I realized that Riku loved me completely, and yet I still thought of Sora every single day.  I thought that it wasn't fair to Riku to stay with him and still be thinking about someone else.  He proposed to me and I…I had to reject him.  I thought that was best."

            Nadia took a moment to process this and for that time the room was quite still.  It was darker, now; the candle's light was dwindling.  Kairi's strength seemed to be on the same path, or, perhaps, her mood had created the hollow tone the woman now employed.

            The light went out, suddenly.  Maybe a draft had extinguished it.

            "Mom?"  She was horrified, suddenly, trying to break the connection in her mind between the candle's flame and her mother's life…  "Mom?"

            "It's hard, you know," Kairi told her in a broken voice.  Nadia realized she was fighting back sobs.  "Love can be the most painful thing in the world.  I think that the deepest wounds come from people you love and trust…"

            Nadia knew exactly what her mother meant.

            "Did Riku feel betrayed?  I don't know.  I hope to God not, but…  But I sure felt like a traitor.

            "Sometimes it's when people love each other the most that they can hurt each other the worst.  Not on purpose, but it happens.  I didn't want him to keep loving me.  He should have hated me.  I wish he had hated me…"

            Nadia understood then.

            "I miss Papa," she whispered into the darkness.

            "I miss him too, baby.  Every single day."

            Nadia fell into her mother's embrace, became buried in her mother's arms, as she hadn't been for nearly a decade.  She felt like a little girl again. She felt her father's loss from a perspective other than one of self-pity.  She realized what a great man he had been and how, up until now, she had mourned the hole Riku had left in her life and not Riku himself.

            Maybe people were designed to be selfish.

~*~

            Kairi held her daughter for a long time in that darkened room.  She finally drifted off to sleep.  Her new baby was close by, in another room with the doctor, being watched around the clock.  Selphie and Tidus had taken Rinny home so all three of them could get a little rest, especially since the two adults had not had any sleep at all.  Sora, Edgar, and Jalen were at the dock fishing for supper.

            It was there that they first saw the boat, a simple and small vessel painted white.  The clouds had parted recently, so the thing shone very brightly as the sun's rays struck it.

            The boat docked nearby.  Out stepped the passenger, Andra, Sora's mother.  Despite the heat of the pounding sun, she wore a full-length dress of heavy black fabric.  Her sand-colored hair was tied into a bun, over which a small hat was affixed.   From the hat hung a floor-length veil of translucent black across a somber face.

            She was in mourning.

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my mother's father said that once…  'when someone dies, you're not crying for him, but for the hole he's left in your life.'  something like that…and it's so true.  humans are selfish creatures...  i never knew my grandfather, though; he died when my mom was seventeen.  actually, he had a brain tumor…  don't smoke, kiddies…it'll get into your lungs and then spread to your brain and kill you…  smoking is why i never met my own grandfather…


	9. For You

~*~

            Nadia straightened.  She realized that she, too, had fallen asleep.  Her mother had drifted off a while before her and was still sleeping now.  Nadia opened the window and straightened the covers around Kairi by the long wavelengths of sunset that streamed in.  It was no longer dark in that room.

            It was quiet outside the bedroom.  Nadia could hear the doctor moving around in Jalen's room.  She knew the new baby was there, but it was in poor health and she wasn't sure if she was allowed to see it yet.  Nadia folded in on herself a little, clasped her hands to her chest and murmured a prayer that he or she would make it through.

            There wasn't any noise downstairs.  Nadia went and opened all the windows and started some water boiling over the fire to make tea.  She figured Selphie and Tidus must have returned home.  Edgar too, maybe.  That left Sora and Jalen…

            Nadia didn't really mind being alone.  Her mother had given her a lot to process.  She was mainly thinking about herself, and how much she disliked the person she had become since her father's death…

            She happened to glance over at the counter.  There was a broken mug near the wall.  A few ants were crawling around the area, which meant that the mug's contents had spilled and dried there.  Nadia went about cleaning up the mess and managed to cut her palm just as she threw away the last porcelain shard.  She cursed her own clumsiness.  Her wound bled.

            As she was searching for something to bandage her hand with, the door creaked open.  To her surprise, it was Edgar.  He was carrying a bucket of freshly caught fish, but the expression he wore was dismal.  Jalen soon entered, apparently in a similar mood.  Then the front door opened and there were hushed voices inside the house.  Nadia looked to Edgar, trying to silently prod answers from him.

            "How about we make dinner?" was all Edgar said, choosing not to be helpful.  He placed the bucket down heavily on the counter and a little seawater splashed out onto the floor.  He murmured an apology and began to sop it up with a nearby towel, the same towel Nadia had been using moments earlier.  When the young man stood, he caught sight of her bandaged hand and the bright red leaking through to the surface.  He gave a start.

            "I cut myself when I was cleaning up something," Nadia told him, continuing to wrap the cloth bandage tighter and tighter.  She bit her lip hard, knowing it was just a superficial wound and the pain would soon fade…

            Edgar merely cast sad eyes on her and then started shuffling through drawers until he found a proper knife.  He began to gut the fish with a quick and precise hand.  Nadia was a little startled; she suspected an upper-class, well-dressed, pale-skinned boy like Edgar would not be used to be getting his hands dirty—especially in something's innards.

            Nadia removed the kettle and then retrieved a metal rack from the cabinet and set it over the fire.  She found the porcelain teapot and went about brewing the refreshment.

            When the fish were ready, Edgar set them on the rack and sprinkled some juice and seasoning over them.  Nadia commented that she wasn't aware he knew how to cook, and he explained he had had his chef at home teach him a few tricks before leaving.

            "Believe me…  Up until a few months ago, I hardly knew how to make a decent sandwich," he told her, lowering his head with humility.

            Nadia smiled slightly, and it felt good to ignore the oppression of the big house, at least for a small moment.  She could still hear the ominous murmur of voices a few rooms away.  Jalen had left, perhaps to investigate.

            "So how is your mother doing?" Edgar asked as he finished washing his hands after he'd disposed of the less desirable parts of the fish.

            "I think she's okay," the girl replied, her back to him as she began slicing some bread.  Nadia paused momentarily.  "She told me a lot of things I never knew before."

            Edgar made a noise of acknowledgement, but it seemed he wasn't quite sure what to say.

            "About her past and that kind of stuff.  About my father and her…and Sora."  She tightened her grip on the knife.  She had hated Sora for so long, she couldn't just _stop_.  Her wrists were still bruised, weren't they?

            Nadia got out a platter and set some small teacups on it.  She would bring some for her mother, the doctor, Sora…

            "I believe you need one more," Edgar said.

            "Hmm?"

            "You have a guest."

            She eyed him strangely and set down another cup.

            "Watch the fish, would you, Edgar?  I'm going to bring the adults some tea."

            "As you wish, my lady," he replied, performing a formal bow.

~*~

            Sora guided his mother into the sitting room and helped the woman ease back into the couch.  Jalen crawled over and sat in her lap.  The woman, who had pushed her veil over the back of her head, wiped her eyes a little, even though they were dry.

            Her son wondered if she was so accustomed to crying that she failed to notice her eyes had run out of tears.

            "And how are things here?" Andra wondered, cradling Jalen affectionately.  "I've been going on about your father so much…  I should have thought to ask before."

           "Actually…"  Sora sighed.  "Things have been really bad the past few days, Mom.  I wouldn't have told you because you have so much else to worry about, but since you're here…"

            She looked up and cast her mother's eyes on him, her forehead wrinkling with concern.  "What is it, Sora?"

            "Nadia blew up at me—oh, when was it?"  _I've lost track of time_, he realized.  _Things have gone by so fast and then slow…  It's…surreal.  Was it really only yesterday that Nadia and I argued?_

            "You two had a fight?" pressed his mother.

            "Yes.  She was angry at me…said I was trying to be her father.  It was pretty ugly…"  He tried not to remember the red-hot blade of her accusations as it had burned into his heart.  "She said Kairi and I were responsible for Riku…you know…"  Sora sighed again—for probably the tenth time since he'd started his explanation.  He looked to his mother's face, wondering if she would understand about the monster being released.  Would she grow fearful towards him, as Kairi had?

            Sora shrugged it off.  Now was not the time to explain such things.  Maybe he would try later…

            "Kairi got pretty upset and…she went into labor early."

            "Oh, dear…"

            "Tidus went and got the doctor, and Selphie helped Kairi through the night.  He was delivered at about noon today…  It's almost a month early."

            "So is he doing all right?"

            "He's so _small_…"  Sora remembered holding the tiny child in his arms after he was cleaned off.  Kairi had been unconscious then…  The baby had been so small, maybe the size of Sora's hand, and looked almost purple.  But he'd been breathing, and even had produced a faint cry.

            "The doctor is with him now, to watch over him.  We're supposed to keep everything around him very clean."

            It was then that Nadia entered the room, her fingers curled tightly around the edges of a platter of teacups.  She seemed startled upon seeing Andra, but regained her balance quickly.  Around her hand was a tightly wound cloth bandage.

            "Nadia, darling," Sora's mother said gently, holding out one arm.  "Come here."

            "Hi, Andra," Nadia greeted uncertainly.  She set down the tray and accepted a hug.

            "Sora here was just telling me about your new brother," Andra said, shifting Jalen in her lap.

            "So it's a boy?  I didn't know yet."

            "He's beautiful," Sora told her.

            "I brought you guys some tea," Nadia announced, turning her back to the adults.  She removed two cups from the tray and set them on the table.  "These are for the doctor and Mom," she explained, lifting the platter again.

            When Nadia had left, Andra turned back to her son.

            "You know, you were born a couple weeks early, too."

            "Really?  I didn't know that."

            "Gave us quite a fright," she admitted, the look in her eyes growing distant.  "But you were a fighter.  In only a year you were bigger and stronger than the other babies your age, and just look at you now."  She returned to the present and touched his face with a wrinkled fingertips.  "Such a handsome and strong man I have for a son."

            "Thanks, Mom," Sora said, humbled by the bright and proud look his mother was giving him.

            "Your father and I met when I was twenty-five.  It was a slow courtship, you know…"  She shook her head.  "He was always so stubborn.  After we finally got married, I told him I wanted a big family.  He told me we could have however big a family I wanted, since I would be the one delivering the children."  Andra was softly smiling once more.  It was the first smile Sora had seen since her arrival.  "We tried for years…  There were so many times I was sure I was pregnant…  But I was wrong…every time…

            "I think fate was making sure I got _you_, Sora.  The best son I could have asked for."

            Sora could not meet her eyes.  She was so proud of him.  But she had no idea of the terror that lurked deep inside of him, did she?  Would her feelings be different if she knew the whole truth?

            "When you came early, they told me you only had a fifty percent chance of survival.  I was already older than any first-time mother I knew.  I said, 'No, you're lying.  He's got a hundred percent chance.  Why?  Because I say so.'  And your father glared at the doctors—scared those poor men half to death!—and said the baby would live, or there'd be Hell to pay.

            "So they took very special care of you, and here you are.  I couldn't ask for anything more beautiful than this…to know that my son is well."

            Her grandson struggled in her lap, clutching at her slightly wrinkled neck with both of his slightly chubby, five-year-old's arms.

            "Oh, and my son's family, too, little Jalen."

            The boy seemed content with that.

            _Mom…  I wish I could tell you everything about me.  But now's not the time.  I want to be there for you, now that Dad is gone…___

            "Excuse me," Edgar announced from the kitchen doorway.  "Dinner is served."

            _Someday, I'll explain everything…_

~*~

            Kairi awoke very early the next morning.  Perhaps it was because she had slept almost all of the previous day.  It had to be five or six in the morning now.  She imagined everyone else would be asleep.  She thought of her precious little baby, who she had not yet seen, and worried for him.

            She looked around the room in that special light of early morning; someone had left the window open above her.  There was also an extinguished candle, a cold cup of tea, and a cold dinner of fish, bread, and salad.  People had been concerned for her, Kairi realized.  She couldn't remember anything being brought, though; her last memories were of that long talk with Nadia.

            There was also some clean water and a towel near the bed.  Kairi found the strength to get herself up and washed.  She changed her underclothes and tied a simple baby blue bathrobe around her body.  She also took the time to pull the dirty sheets off her bed and pile them up, together with the towel, for laundry.

            Kairi went to the other window in her room, the one near the vanity.  She gazed down on the beach and the crashing waves so far below.  The morning breeze played with her short hair, curling the wet strands around her chin and ears.  At first she fought this, rearranging the hair with quick, thin fingers.  The wind persisted and she at last gave in, allowing it to style her hair as it pleased.

            She realized she didn't have much strength in her, not yet.  She leaned heavily on her elbows, and sighed.

            "Kairi?"

            She recognized Sora's voice immediately.  Why she hadn't heard the door open or his footsteps creak across the wooden floorboards?  She was faintly aware that Sora had been with her most of that night she was in labor, but only faintly.  She had no real memories of that time.  Her last clear memory was of her husband saying that he would leave…forever…

_The joy from my heart at our sudden meeting says___

_"Maybe it'll be over before I know it..." those forebodings scare me_

            "It's pretty early, isn't it?  What are you doing up?"

            "I could be asking you the same thing," Kairi replied, hugging the windowsill tightly as she stood crouched over it.  She tried to ignore the sting of tears in the corners of her eyes.

            "Couldn't sleep…  Too worried about…everything."

            The tears began to run down her cheeks.  They were hot.

            "Can I sit down, Kairi?  You don't mind, do you?"

            "Go right ahead," she said rather flatly in an attempt to keep the sadness from her voice.

            She could hear the mattress absorb Sora's weight as he sank down onto it.

_And then I was gazing into your eyes_

_Without understanding anything___

            "I hope you don't mind me being here, Kairi.  I thought you'd be asleep.  I would have just…watched over you for a while…"  He sounded very wistful.

            Kairi ran her tongue across dry lips.  No words came to her.

            "I don't mind you being here, Sora.  I thought you were going to leave, though…  Forever…"

            "I meant to."

            "Are you going to leave, then…?"  She felt a little scared as she tried to anticipate his reply.  "When this is all over?"

            "If you want, Kairi.  If you would feel safer without me."

_They're not forever changing, so how many phantoms,___

_Like memories and dreams, could you file away?_

            Her heart felt as though it were being squeezed.  _How…  How could I feel safe without you, Sora…?___

            "You were frightened of me…"

            "_That_ person I was scared of, but not the you I've known all my life."

            "That's just what I'm worried about, Kairi…" Sora murmured.  Kairi realized that the man was behind her, that his hands were hovering just above her shoulders.

            She turned carefully so she was practically in his arms, but the two hesitated and did not touch one another.  It was very tense, and Kairi held her face down so he would not see her hot tears.

            "_He_ is a part of me…  A part of me I thought had died a long time ago."

            _A part of you…_

            "A part of me I wish didn't exist."

            _A part of _you_, the man I love…_

            "But he does exist.  Deep inside my heart he's there, Kairi.  He's a monster.  A _monster_…"  The words must have been so sickening to him; he almost gagged as they came out.  "A monster born in the darkness…  I think…  I think I gave up hope so many times back then, and I needed something…inhuman…to take over and preserve my body…"

            Sora was speaking quietly at that time, in harsh whispers.

_And now I gazed into your eyes___

_Without changing anything_

            "You don't need a monster to take care of you anymore," Kairi murmured, spreading the fingers on one hand and pressing them against his heart.  "You have me, don't you?"  She gazed up into his eyes.  He looked frightened, then, almost like a lost little boy.  Her heart called out to his.

            "But what…what if I hurt you—or the children?"

            She shook her head.  "I know you wouldn't.  Still…  I'm here for you, Sora.    I've been looked after so many times…  I want us to take care of one another.  We can banish this monster together…can't we?"

            "Kairi…"

            "There's nothing to be afraid of, Sora," she whispered, leaning her face against his chest and encircling his body with her arms.  "Just as long as we're together, we can overcome anything."

_If I close my eyes, I want to hold___

_Your vanishing body once more in my arms_

            She touched the pendant around her neck, the keepsake she had loaned Sora so long ago.  He had returned it to her eight years ago, and she had worn it ever since the moment he tied it around her neck.  It was even more precious to her than the silver wedding band on her finger.

            Sora placed his hand over hers on top of the glittering pendant.  "Thank you…"

            Kairi pulled herself into the man's warm embrace once more.  He was her friend…her lover…the father of her children.  He was everything to her.  She would never feel safer than at times like this.  Never more sure of her love for him.  

            "Just…never leave me," Kairi pleaded into his warm chest.

            For so long she had clung to their happy childhood.  She had thought things could be as they always were.  Now she still treasured those innocent times, but did not live hoping in vain for their return.  The future was something she could face, as long as those she loved were close by.

_Because I can't forget that time, that place where we met...___

            "I promise.  I'll stay by your side.  Always."

_Dancing in the breeze, your body___

_Was being enveloped in light_

~*~

            "I know you're there, Edgar.  You can stop hiding in the trees like some kind of animal."

            Edgar produced himself from the dense mesh of green.  He was wearing a simple short-sleeved shirt and gray trousers.  His hair was free, sitting on his neck in sophisticated blond waves.  He wore a simple smile and kept his hands in his pockets.

            "I did not wish to disturb you when you were…"  He motioned toward the gravestone with one hesitating elbow.

_I was only watching you___

_I was forever gazing into your eyes_

            "It's all right," Nadia told him.  She herself was wearing an orange tank top and a long khaki skirt.  Her long red hair was pulled back and tied into a four-stranded braid down her back.  She held her hands clasped together in front of her, the attached arms hanging down somewhat loosely.

            "I only came to say goodbye to Papa, since we're leaving for a while."

            "Yes…  Sora came and asked me if I would help take care of the house…"

            The girl smirked a little, not minding seeing him a little puzzled.  "There's better medical facilities on the bigger islands, so my whole family's going to stay at Sora's parents' orchard for a few months.  The doctor says the baby'll be okay eventually, but he needs special care."

            "Has your family chosen a name yet?"

            "That's the other thing," Nadia said, undoing the knot her fingers had made.  She walked over to the grave and touched one palm against the stone.  "Mom and Sora asked me if they could name him 'Riku'…to honor my father."

            "Did you accept?"

            "I'm still thinking about it," she admitted, biting her lip.  She stood up again.  He came to her and she did not back away from him.

_Even now I watch only you___

_Without changing anything___

            "You know, Edgar," she began, her eyes finding the ground very intriguing.  "I've been thinking.  Ever since I was seven years old, I've concentrated on hating Sora and blaming him for ruining my life.  It's really a big part of who I am."

            She paused.  It was getting to be more difficult than she'd expected…

            "I realize now that I wasted all that part of my life being so angry.  But it's who I am now, and I can't get it out of me.  All that anger and resentment is…_me_."

            To say these things made them real.  Her heart beat fast.

            "I'm sorry I have to burden you with this," she muttered quickly, turning away.  "It's just that…you're probably the closest thing to a friend I've ever had…"

            Nadia felt sick to her stomach.  She wanted to vomit she was so disgusted with the person she had become.

            "That's kind of you to say," Edgar replied.

            "No, it's not!  What a pain it must be to hang around someone as awful as me!  I…I _hate_ myself..."

            "Please don't say that," he pleaded, gently placing one hand on her shoulder.  "I certainly do not wish for you to hate yourself.  I am…_honored_ that you consider me a friend, Nadia."

_If I stretch out my hand, the smile I reach is pained_

            She felt almost as though she were choking.  She gripped one hand into a fist and held it over her heart.  Was there even a heart there anymore?  She was so disgusted with herself.  All this time, she had thought she was defending Riku's name, when she had, in reality, only selfishly shielded her own wounded heart.  She had never even properly mourned her father.

            She had only grown bitter.  More and more bitter…

            "If you want to start healing, you will have to forgive yourself first," Edgar declared, his voice stern.  More softly, he added, "You were the victim of a terrible situation, I can understand that, but today you are in control of your own destiny, are you not?  You have the potential to be any sort of person you want."

            "I know, but…"

            "Everyone around you cares about you, Nadia.  Your mother, Sora, Jalen…  Selphie and Tidus.  You do not believe they would support you if you tried to reform yourself?"

            "I know that they would…"

            "I don't want you to be unhappy," Edgar murmured, holding her other shoulder now, too.  "As your friend, I ask you to help yourself."

            Nadia licked her lips.  She was sniffling a little and wiped her tears before turning back to him and looking up into his kind face.  "That school your father owns…  Andra says it would be good for me to go there.  I've never had any formal schooling before."

            "Would you be away from me for longer, then?"

            "I guess so."

            He leaned forward, as if to kiss her.

            Nadia laughed and pushed him away.  As he regained his balance, she smirked.  "You think I'd kiss you?  I might be starting to change, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna let you get that close to me, you lecher.  I don't plan to fall in love.  It's way too much trouble."

            Edgar adjusted his hair, gathering up the scattered pieces of his pride.  "When you are away, I can only pray your heart will grow all the more fonder of me."

            "Good luck with that."

            "Oh, Nadia, you're here."

            A slightly tired-looking Kairi was approaching from the beach, a bundle in her arms.  Sora, Andra, and Jalen were not far behind.  They were dressed for travel.

            "Have you decided yet?" Kairi asked her daughter when all the people had gathered together.

            Nadia looked down at the bundle in Kairi's arms.  She had not seen her new brother before now.  She inhaled sharply to see how small he was.

            "What do you think, Nadia?" Sora asked.  He had a few flowers from his garden clasped between his big, tanned hands.

            Nadia looked up at him.  She studied his face carefully.  The bruises on her wrists had begun to fade.  Her heart was starting its transformation.  Could she forgive this man?

            It would certainly be difficult.  Perhaps impossible.

            But she could try.

            "Yes," Nadia announced, nodding.  "I've decided."

            Everyone watched her anxiously.

            "I want him to have Papa's name."

            Kairi's eyes sparkled.  Jalen, Sora, and Edgar were cheering.  Andra smiled a quiet sort of smile.

            "Would you like to hold him, Nadia?" Kairi asked, holding the baby slightly away from herself.

            "Could I?"  She accepted the precious pile of blanket and child.  The little Riku stirred momentarily, then returned peacefully to his dreams.

            Sora went to the grave and placed the bouquet over the tall green grass.  Kairi joined him.  They held hands and leaned against one another.  Nadia tried to imagine her father standing with them.  Those three had all been best friends…

            Andra, who had been silent up until now, observed from Nadia's side, "What a beautiful baby, huh?"

            "Yeah," Nadia said.  She beamed down at the baby.  "I only agreed to the name because he's handsome enough to be a Riku."

            The older woman smiled.  She had been staying with them a week now, since the day she'd brought news of her husband's passing.  Nadia did not regret spending time with her in the least.

            "Have you thought about going to school yet?"

            "Yeah.  Yeah, I think I'll go."

            "It'll be good for you," Andra told her.  "And you can live with me, too."

            "That'll be fun," Nadia replied, grinning.

            "Ah…  Well, I think it's time to set sail," Sora announced.

            "You ready, Nadia?" Kairi asked.

            Her daughter nodded and handed the baby back carefully.  The whole family began to leave together, but Edgar called Nadia back, pleading for only a moment more.

            He dug around in his pocket to retrieve something.  "This is for you, Nadia."  He held out his hand and from his long fingers dangled a chain with a small, shimmering stone on the end.

            "For me?"  She approached him and inspected the stone, her eyes big and blue and curious.

            "I apologize it took me this much time," Edgar explained.  "At first, I didn't know it was your birthday.  Then I tried to invent something properly suited to you, but I failed there as well.  It was almost too late, but I finally realized that only the earth could offer something unique enough for you."

_If I close my eyes, I want to hold___

_Your vanishing body once more in my dreams___

_Because I can't forget that time, that place where we met..._

            He dropped the stone into her palm as the chain lingered around his fingers.  "This is an opal.  Each piece is different.  Look at it in the sunlight and the moonlight.  It will look beautiful every time."  He let the chain slide from his hand.

            "I could not tell you before, Nadia," Edgar said, "but happy birthday."

            "Yes…  Thank you."  The girl reached back to fasten it around her neck.          "Thank you, Edgar."  She winked.  "But this doesn't mean I'm going to kiss you."

            "That is perfectly all right, my lady."

            "Good."

            There was silence between them for a time.  Nadia knew she had to leave, but something was tugging at her heart, telling her she really didn't want to leave him just yet.

            "Farewell for now," Edgar said at last, bowing his head.

            "You silly," she mumbled, taking him by surprise as she leapt up into his arms.  She clutched him tightly around the shoulders, almost throwing him completely off balance.  He hesitated with shock at first, but then returned the embrace.

            Nadia slipped away from him, her hand sliding down into his.  "I'm glad I've decided to change.  It feels nice to have a real friend."

            Edgar squeezed the girl's fingers between his own.  "Indeed it does, my lady."

_Because I can't forget...___

~*~ Life is But a Dream:  End ~*~

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Song:  _Emu~for my dear~_ copyright Gackt and Nippon Crown; translation by Mina-P (minako@senshigakuen.com)

Happy 4th of July, everybody!  I still celebrate what this country is supposed to stand for.  Freedom for all!  Yay!  *waves the flag around a lil'*  ^_^

Wau.  I've been working on this big finale all week (and I didn't know it was going to be _this_ big!  4500+ words!!!)  I wanted to give all my WONDERFUL readers a happy ending after tugging at their heartstrings with the ending of _Dreams Before Yesterday_ (hey, I cried too, you know…)  Sure, not _every_ problem is resolved…  But isn't anybody's life a constantly evolving thing?  …It would take years and many chapters to fix Nadia's messed-up psyche, anyway @_@

Sorry this wasn't up sooner…  My family's had some stresses this week…  We just found out my cousin is going to Iraq…  My only remaining grandparent, my eighty-year-old grandmother, is having some health problems…  It hasn't been easy at all, I tell you what.  I've been pretty depressed. -_-  Luckily, I've had Xenosaga to keep my mind off things, as well as my wonderful boyfriend to cheer me up ^_^  Ooh, and writing, of course! ^^;;

Anyway…  In case you're interested, I have another KH fic in the planning stages already.  Something _very_ different from this story.  Megumi-sempai knows what I'm talking about.  ^_~  Be on the look out, minna-san!  And thank you all so much!!!!!!


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